THE     NEW    YORK    TIMES     B0» 


SPIRITUALISM 


A  Record  of  Experiences  in  Psy- 
chical Research 


rE:R?:OXAI>     EXT'FRIEXCES     IX     SPIRIT- 
UALISM.   By  }I.rt'\v'ard  Curriugtoi .    IIlus- 

rr-. t..  ;         V'r,        'Ti         London:     T.     WV"'-' 


MK.  L'AlllUXGTON'S  new  JO'.'ic  |, 
goes  far  toward  fixing  tl  j  au- 
thor's status  as  a  sincere  in- 
vestigator of  abnormal  piiencmeiia 
whether  interpreted  as  such  <•.-  as 
trickery  or  as  manifestations  o;  the 
supernatural.  He  frankly  states  that 
he  believes  08  per  cent,  of  the  me(Uunta 
to  be  false,  but  deems  the  remaining  2 

per  cent,    worthy   of  further   invi  itiga- 
+  ''^n,   if   not  of   belief.     His   attitude   to- 

id  this  2  per  cent,  is  that  of  t  le  ex- 
I'Kjrer  toward  an  undiscovered  river 
source,  of  the  chemist  toward  ya  un- 
Icnown  element— the  fact  of  their  power 
is  believed  in  but  their  existence  is  still 
a  mystery. 
Another     interesting     feature     Cl     tl»e 

'  is  that  it  draws  a  clear  line  of 
cation  between  scienUfi.*  an*[  ^'hil- 
u.-,xjph  al  research.  Many  writers  on 
P3>-chic  phenomena  employ  both  meth- 
ods, so  that  one  really  finds  them  spec- 
ulating upon  the  attributes  of  the  un- 
kr.own  before  they  have  established  the 

>ence  of  tiie  unknown  as  a  fact. 
Atr.  Carrington's  contribution  to  this 
ptiase  of  the  subject  is  chiefly  that  of 
editor.  "Death:  Its  Causes  and  Phe- 
nonaena,"  (Funk  &  Wagnall's  Company.) 
which  he  compiled  in  conjunction  with 
John  R.  Meader,  is  a  5oO-page  volume 
ainung  to  set  forth  all  that  science  has 
learned  in  regard  to  death,  together 
with  what  philosophy  has  contributed 
to  show  that  it  is  not  the  end,  physical, 
mental,  or  spiritual.  This  bool-  is  a 
storehouse  of  unusual  information— from 
the  latest  clinical  demonstration  to  the 
latest  theological  belief,  from  the  earliest 
manifestations  of  immortality  gathered 

Biblical  writer^  to  the  more   recent 

*-»^alizatlons    iii   the   medium's    cab- 


both  dealing  with  phenomena  comraonlj^ 
called  spiritualistic.  In  both  the  writer's 
zeal  for  truth  is  manifested.  He  brings 
to  his  experiments  a  long  experience  as 
prestidigitator  and  as  a  detector  of  trick- 
ery. He  reveals  the  truth  about  u?tny 
interesting  mysteries  which  for  mouth-s. 
and  sometime-;  years,  baffled  the  most 
.searching  investigation.  "  Slate  writ- 
ing." •■  spirit  pictures,"  &C.,  are  "x 
plained;  the  fraud  In  tb^  "PMtuigt^jst.- 
T.ily  Dale,  and  *'  The  Great  Amhcrs*; 
-li  sierj- "  i.r  laia  trarr.  i  ;iu^  .".i;  rirst 
part  of  tlie  book  is  an  exposure  of  the 
98  per  cent.,  and  the  results,  althong^h, 
quite  absorbing  and  oiten  drnwnat^TeaHy^^ 
set  forth,  are  all  negative. 

The  second  part  of  the  book  ce^nsists 
almost  entirely  of  phenomena  produced 
by  the  Eusapia  Palladino,  accounts  of 
which  ha\'e  not  hitherto  been  published, 
or,  if  published,  have  becA  set  forth 
with  imperfect  accuracy.  For  example, 
it  is  shown  that  Prof.  Munsterberg'.s 
account  of  one  stance  published  in  a 
magazine  is  not  in  accord  with  what  ac- 
tually happened.  The  author  in  this 
instance  lays  bare  the  whole  history  o.f 
the  case  by  the  stenographic  report 
taken  at  the  time.  The  results  of  the 
second  part  of  the  book  are  positive. 

These  positive  results  taken  in  con- 
nection with  what  Sir  Oliver  Lodge  and 
other  scientific  invcsigators,  who  are 
also  philosophers,  have  expounded  or 
cA.rfi.iwCv:,  hu.vc  cauced  the  ■■■\^.i>'r>v  to 
express  the  need  of  a  psychical  labora- 
tory to  take  up  the  subject  where  the 
psychological  laboratory  of  Prof.  Mfins- 
terberg  leaves  it. 

When   the   first   psychological    labora- 
tory   was    established    at    Harvard    In 
1890  its  raison  d'etre  was  quite  as  doubt- 
ful   as    that    of  a    psj^chical    laboratory 
would  be  to-day.    Yet  it  has  been  of  in- 
calculable value  in  the  field  of  criminol- 
ogy  alone.      The   work   for   a  psychical 
laboratory  would  be  no  less  promising. 
To  be  sure,   it  might  very   early  in  its 
existence  reduce  Mr.  Carringcon's  2  per 
cent,  to  a  nought,  but  even  so,  we  should 
th^n    know    exactly    how   t      '''    '    W 
all  mediums  in  the  future, 
that  the  persistent  2  per  c 
terly    annihilated    there 
as  the  author  points 
for  scientific  investiga    '  ■ 

,5Ixperiments      in      tJ, 


Charles  Josselyn 


DEATH 


ITS   CAUSES    AND    PHENOMENA 

WITH  SPECIAL  REFERENCE  TO 
IMMORTALITY 


BY 

HEREWARD   CARRINGTON 

tATE  MEMBER  OF  THE  COUNCIL  OF  THE  AMERICAN  SOCIETY  FOR  PSYCHICAL  R1;SEA|?CM 

AUTHOR  OF  "VITALITY,  PASTING  AND  NUTRITION,"  "THE  COMING  SCIENCE," 

••  THE  PHYSICAL  PHENOMENA  OF  SPIRITUALISIB,"  **  HINDU  HAGIC,'-' 

•*  EUSAPIA  PALLADINO  AND  HER  PHENOMENA,"   ETC.  ETC. 

AND 

JOHN    R.   MEADER 

("GRAHA.M   HOOD") 

AEMBER  OF  THE  AMERICAN   STATISTICAL  SOCIETV  AND  OF  THE  SOCIETY 

FOR  PSYCHICAL  RESEARCH 

AUTHOR  OP  "  THE  LAWS  OF  6DCCB6S,"  ETC. 


**  It  is  apparent  that  a  study  of  the  circumstances  of  natural 
death  .  .  .  may  give  rise  to  facts  of  the  highest  interest  to 
science  and  to  humanity.'''' — Metchnikoff. 


FUNK  &  WAGNALLS  Company 
PUBLISHERS 
NEW  YORK 
1912 


PREFACE 

The  subject  which  we  have  discussed  at  length  in  this 
volume — Death — is  generally  looked  upon  as  some- 
thing to  be  "  tabooed "  by  polite  society ;  something 
unpleasant,  which  may  some  day  come  upon  us,  but 
which  we  desire  to  think  about  as  little  as  possible  in 
the  interval.  There  is  no  logical  ground  for  this 
position,  however,  and,  scientifically  speaking,  death 
may  be  made  as  fascinating  a  study  as  any  other. 
Divested  of  the  superstition  and  glamour  which  usually 
surround  it,  death  assumes  the  appearance  of  a  most 
interesting  scientific  problem,  both  from  its  physiolo- 
gical and  from  its  psychological  side. 

But  there  is  another  side  to  this  question  which 
must  by  no  means  be  overlooked.  We  refer  to  the 
possibility  of  postponing  death,  on  the  one  hand,  and 
of  rendering  it  more  painless,  on  the  other.  Both  of 
these  results  can  only  be  effected  by  a  thorough 
understanding  of  the  process  involved :  and  this,  in 
turn,  can  only  be  obtained  by  a  close,  scientific 
study  of  the  problem  —  one  that  includes  all  its 
aspects,  and  treats  of  them  impartially.  In  summing 
up  this  evidence,  in  condensing  what  has  been  said — 


6158x5 


vi  PREFACE 

the  speculations  that  have  been  offered  during  the 
past  two  hundred  years  (sec  Bibliography) — we  are 
satisfied  that  we  have  collated  a  quantity  of  interesting 
material;  while  the  particular  theories  as  to  the 
nature  of  death  which  we  have  advanced,  will  not, 
we  hope,  be  without  interest,  and  perhaps  utility. 
As  we  differ  considerably  from  one  another  in  our 
theories  as  to  the  causation  of  old  age  and  natural 
death,  we  have  thought  it  best  to  devote  separate 
chapters  to  these  topics — each  advancing  his  own 
views.  Later,  we  have  tried  to  reconcile  our  opposing 
theories.  Finally,  in  collecting  and  presenting  the 
views  of  a  number  of  scientific  men  on  what  con- 
stitutes natural  death,  we  have  sounded  opinion  upon 
a  hitherto  all  but  neglected  subject,  and  we  wish  to 
thank  our  contributors  in  this  place  for  what  they 
have  done  for  science,  no  less  than  for  us. 

The  final  question  to  which  we  have  addressed  our- 
selves is,  perhaps,  the  most  vital  and  interesting  of 
all.  The  question  of  what  becomes  of  the  mental  life 
at  death :  whether  consciousness  persists,  or  is  extin- 
guished— like  the  flame  of  the  candle — is  of  interest 
alike  to  science  and  to  philosophy ;  and  we  have 
presented  a  considerable  quantity  of  material  bearing 
upon  this  question,  tending  to  show  that  consciousness 
does  persist,  and  that  personal  identity  is  assured  to 
us.  In  arriving  at  this  conclusion,  we  feel  that  an 
important  forward  step  has    been  taken  in  the   correct 


PART  I 

PHYSIOLOGICAL 


A 


CHAPTER   I 

THE   SCIENTIFIC  ASPECT  OF   LIFE  AND  DEATH 

Death  is  universally  recognised  as  the  inevitable  fate  of 
every  living  thing — the  goal  towards  which  animate  life 
is  constantly  tending — and  yet,  strange  as  it  may  appear, 
human  ingenuity  has  not  yet  succeeded  in  formulating  a 
definition  that  will  adequately  cover  this  last  experience 
of  man.  We  know  that  all  things  that  live  must  grow 
old  and  die,  but  our  theories  concerning  the  causes  that 
produce  this  phenomenon  are  still  almost  entirely  of  a 
speculative  character.  To  say  that  death  "  is  a  cessation 
of  life  "  is  to  avoid  the  question.  Even  Spencer's  defini- 
tion, in  which  he  pronounced  life  to  be  "  the  continual 
adjustment  of  internal  to  external  relations,"  and  death, 
a  want  of  correspondence  between  those  relations,  leaves 
much  to  be  desired.  It  presents  the  fads  of  life  and 
death  as  we  behold  them,  but  it  fails  absolutely  to  trace 
these  apparent  effects  to  the  causes,  of  which  they  are  the 
natural  manifestation.^ 

As  far  as  positive  science  is  concerned,  the  only  im- 
mortality that  can  be  demonstrated  is  that  of  race.  The 
individual  dies,  from  natural  causes  or  by  accident,  as  the 
case  may  be,  but,  as  each  living  thing  is  the  direct  result 
of  reproduction  from  another  form,  the  death  of  the  in- 
dividual has  practically  no  effect  upon  the  continuance  of 

^  "  Is  it  not  obvious  that  this  definition  merely  gives  or  states  the  effects 
of  life — its  phenomena — and  does  nothing  to  state  what  its  real  essence  is 
at  all  ?  .  .  .  Life  is  that  which  adjusts,  not  the  adjustments  themselves.'' — 
y^itality,  Fcntinrj  and  Nutrition,  pp.  33-4-5.     (See  also  Appendix  C. ) 


4  DEATH 

existence  of  the  race.  With  this  so-called  potential  im- 
mortality, therefore,  science  is  satisfied.  Beyond  this  it 
finds  no  room  for  speculation — no  opportunity  for  its 
experiments. 

To  make  this  position  clear  to  the  mind  of  those  Avho 
have  not  been  accustomed  to  the  materialistic  view  of 
the  phenomena  of  life  and  death,  it  may  be  necessary  to 
explain  that  science  recognises  no  new  organism  in  the 
product  of  reproduction  any  more  than  it  distinguishes  a 
new  creation  in  the  changes  that  are  so  constantly  occur- 
ring in  the  form  of  living  matter.  Even  a  slight 
acquaintance  with  the  first  principles  of  science  is 
sufficient  to  explain  what  this  means,  for  we  know 
that  the  atoms  that  constitute  the  human  body  are 
so  lacking  in  stability  that  they  are  ever  being  dis- 
carded and  replaced  by  other  substances  derived 
through  the  process  of  assimilation.  In  other  words, 
the  one  property  that  best  distinguishes  living  matter 
from  dead  matter  is  what  might  be  termed  the  faculty 
of  self-creation,  or  the  ability  to  transform  the  dead 
substances  assimilated  into  the  same  live  substance  of 
which  this  matter  is  composed.  Thus,  as  long  as  life 
continues,  this  process  goes  on  with  unceasing  regu- 
larity. /TDead  matter  is  cast  aside,  just  as  one  would 
discard  a  worn-out  garment,  and  new  matter  is  created 
to  take  its  place.  When  this  faculty  ceases  to  perform 
its  functions,  death  follows  speedily.', 

Both  Huxley  and  Cuvier  have  used  the  river  whirlpool 
as  an  exact  illustration  of  the  nature  of  this  phenomenon 
of  life,  and  most  physiologists  agree  that  this  whirl  of 
water,  as  seen,  for  example,  at  Niagara,  is  an  extremely 
close  reproduction  of  the  natural  process  of  assimilation 
and  disintegration — the  alternating  attraction  and  repul- 
sion of  the  ever-changing  particles  representing  the  actual 
conditions  of  physical  life.     That  a  material  substratum 


SCIENTIFIC  ASPECT  OF  LIFE  AND  DEATH     5 

is  left  unchanged,  there  can  be  no  doubt ;  but  even  this 
theory  does  not  modify  the  conchisions  that  science  has 
drawn  from  this  reproduction  of  the  whirl  of  life.  Though 
it  may  be  true  that  the  animal  body  contains  permanent 
elements  of  definite  composition,  they  alone  are  insufficient 
to  assure  the  continuance  of  physical  existence. 

It  seems  to  be  the  popular  impression  that  this 
physical  body  begins  its  work  of  development  at  birth ; 
that  it  continues  to  progress  until  the  individual  has 
attained  that  rather  indefinite  period  generally  termed 
'*  maturity,"  and  that,  when  this  point  has  been  reached, 
definite  deterioration  commences.  From  all  that  science 
has  been  able  to  determine,  however,  this  idea  is  quite 
contrary  to  fact,  for  all  the  practical  experiments  in 
biology  indicate  that  the  body  begins  to  lose  its  re- 
creative powers,  or  the  capacity  to  change  dead  matter 
into  living  matter,  very  shortly  after  the  period  of  birth, 
and  that,  from  this  time,  the  decrease  in  force  continues 
steadily.     As  one  writer  has  said  : — 

"In  want  of  a  more  exact  knowledge  of  the  structure  of  the 
living  molecule  and  the  changes  in  structure  that  come  on  in  old 
age,  the  physiologist  expresses  his  idea  of  the  general  nature  of 
these  changes  by  similes  and  metaphors  more  or  less  apt.  We  may 
compare  living  matter  to  a  clock,  the  mainsjjring  of  which  is  so 
constructed  that,  in  consequence  of  slowly  developing  molecular 
changes,  it  suffers  a  gradual  loss  of  elasticity.  In  such  a  mechanism 
there  will  come  a  time  when  '  winding  the  clock  '  will  no  longer 
make  it  run,  since  energy  can  no  longer  be  stored  in  the  spring. 
We  may  imagine  this  loss  of  elasticity  to  develop  gradually,  giving 
stages  that  may  be  roughly  compared  to  the  periods  of  life.  To 
carry  out  the  simile,  it  is  the  food  we  eat  and  the  oxygen  we 
breathe  that  take  the  place  of  the  winding  force.  In  consequence 
of  a  slowly  developing  molecular  change  in  the  organism,  this 
energy  is  less  efficiently  utilised  as  the  individual  grows  older. 
The  clock  runs  more   feebly  and  needs  relatively  more  frequent 


6  DEATH 

winding,  until  at  last  tlie  elasticity  is  gone,  the  power  of  assimila- 
tion is  insufficient,  and  we  have  what  we  call  natural  death."  ^ 

Brown,  in  his  article  on  "  Old  Age,"  ^  has  expressed 
this  truth  more  briefly.  "  The  causes  of  death,"  he  said, 
"  are  not  to  be  found  in  the  summation  of  many  external 
mjuries,  but  are  already  established  wdthin  the  organism 
itself,  and  death  is  simply  the  natural  end  of  develop- 
ment." If  this  theory  be  true,  it  is  very  contradictory 
to  the  definition  formulated  by  Spencer  in  his  Frinciples 
of  Biology.  The  latter  would  logically  lead  the  student  to 
conclude  that  "  external  relations  "  play  the  most  impor- 
tant part  in  determining  the  length  of  life,  and  that,  if 
perfect  correspondence  between  the  internal  and  external 
relations  could  be  secured,  existence  would  continue 
interminably.  As  has  been  shown,  however,  this  idea  is 
entirely  contrary  to  the  behefs  of  modern  physiologists. 
In  their  opinion,  man  would  still  die,  even  though  there 
were  no  injurious  changes  of  environment,  as  the  natural 
weakening  of  the  assimilative  powers  would  alone  be 
sufhcient  to  make  death  inevitable. 

Of  course  the  simile  of  the  clock  is  too  simple  an  illus- 
tration to  be  applied  comprehensively  to  so  complex  an 
organism  as  the  human  body.  In  this  combination  of 
living  matter  there  is  no  single  mainspring  to  wear  out — 
no  one  cause  of  death  against  which  man  may  protect 
himself — and  it  is  due  to  these  conditions  that  death 
does  not  come  to  every  portion  of  the  body  at  precisely 
the  same  moment.  While  it  is  necessarily  true  that 
death  is  actually  the  cessation  of  the  normal  functions 
upon  which  life  depends,  the  causes  Avhich  result  in  the 
suspension  of  the  bodily  mechanism  may  arise  in  any  one 
of  the  several  important  or  vital  centres.  According  to 
the  arrangement  devised  by  Bichat,  death  may  be  divided 

^  W.  H.  Howell  in  Reference  Handbook  of  Medical  Sciences. 
^  British  Medical  Journal,  Oct.  3,  1891. 


I 


SCIENTIFIC  ASPECT  OF  LIFE  AND  DEATH     7 

into  three  classes  : — (1)  that  which  begins  at  the  heart ; 
(2)  that  which  begins  at  the  lungs;  and  (3)  that  which 
begins  at  the  head.  But  the  collapse  of  the  vital  force 
in  a  single  one  of  these  centres  is  sujfificient  to  bring 
death  with  more  or  less  rapidity  to  every  other  portion 
of  the  organism. 

But,  while  most  physiologists  hold  that  it  is  the 
ultimate  fate  of  all  living  things  to  die,  it  must  not 
be  imagined  that  this  is  the  only  theory  to  which 
scientists  subscribe,  for  there  are  some  biologists  who 
are  inclined  to  accept  Weismann's  speculative  con- 
clusions, as  presented  in  the  Essays  upon  Heredity. 

In  these  papers,  this  eminent  biologist  expresses  the 
opinion  that  all  living  matter  once  possessed  potential 
immortality,  and  that  death  is  a  condition  that  came 
into  the  world  because  the  continued  existence  of  the 
individual  had  assumed  the  proportions  of  a  serious 
danger  to  the  general  well-being  of  the  species.  In  other 
words,  death  is  a  condition  that  did  not  necessarily  exist 
in  the  beginning  of  things,  but  was  eventually  adopted 
for  the  reason  that  just  such  a  safety-valve  was  necessary 
to  permit  of  the  perpetuation  of  the  race. 

As  an  illustration  in  proof  of  this  theory,  Weismann 
draws  our  attention  to  the  amoeba,  one  of  the  unicellular 
organisms  or  protozoa,  which  biologists  recognise  as  the 
lowest  forms  of  animal  life.  While  a  complete  cell  in 
itself,  performing  all  the  functions  of  assimilation  and 
reproduction,  it  knows  no  process  of  dissolution  that  can 
be  compared  to  the  phenomenon  that  we  designate  as 
death.  On  the  contrary,  its  very  act  of  reproducing  its 
species  is,  in  itself,  a  striking  example  of  the  possibility 
of  "  physical  immortality,"  for  it  is  the  fate  of  this 
creature  to  continue  to  increase  in  size  until,  finally,  the 
limit  of  growth  is  reached.  At  this  point  the  original 
cell   divides   into    two    parts,   and,   where   one   organism 


8  DEATH 

existed,  there  are  now  two  individuals,  both  of  which 
are  capable  of  performing  the  functions  of  life,  and  of 
dividing  in  turn  into  two  cells — a  process  of  repro- 
duction that,  so  far  as  science  has  been  able  to  ascertain, 
goes  on  indefinitely. 

Of  course,  the  objection  may  be  raised — as  it  has 
been — that  the  original  individual  cell  dies  in  the  act 
of  reproducing  its  offspring,  and  that  the  two  cells  that 
result  from  this  physical  separation  of  the  larger  body 
are  actually  different  individualities.  To  this  Weismann 
replied  that  there  is  no  death  in  this  change  "  because 
there  is  no  corpse."  In  this  fission  we  have  the  illus- 
tration of  the  continuance  of  life,  not  its  dissolution. 

It  is  upon  this  hypothesis  that  Weismann  bases  his 
theory  that  living  matter  originally  possessed  the  ele- 
ments of  potential  immortality,  and  he  explains  the 
appearance  of  death  among  the  metazoa  by  reference  to 
the  law  of  natural  selection. 

If  this  theory  be  correct,  the  possibility  of  never- 
ending  existence  possessed  by  the  unicellular  creature 
was  undoubtedly  passed  on  to  the  more  complex 
organism  which,  in  the  process  of  evolution,  was  eventu- 
ally produced  from  this  lowlier  manifestation  of  animate 
life.  In  the  course  of  time,  however,  certain  new  but 
important  conditions  arose.  In  the  first  place,  death 
became  a  necessity  to  the  perpetuation  of  the  species ; 
and,  in  the  second  place,  the  division  of  functions 
among  the  many  cells  of  the  metazoa  made  the  immor- 
tality of  each  particular  cell  unnecessary  for  reproductive 
purposes. 

The  very  name  that  has  been  applied  to  this  law  of 
evolution,  "  natural  selection,"  gives  an  indication  of  the 
pitiless  qualities  that  mark  its  operations.  As  its  name 
implies,  its  tendency  is  always  towards  the  promotion  of 
the  good  of  the  race,  without  regard  to  the  particular 


SCIENTIFIC  ASPECT  OF  LIFE  AND  DEATH     9 

interests  of  the  individual.  Thus,  when  it  became 
apparent  that  natural  death  was  needed  to  remove 
those  individuals  who  were  not  only  no  longer  necessary 
to  the  welfare  of  the  species,  but  were  actually  an 
adverse  element  or  obstacle  in  the  path  of  natural 
progress,  the  presence  of  those  cells  that  were  no  longer 
required  in  the  process  of  fecundity  gave  nature  the 
opportunity  to  effect  this  adjustment  in  the  laws  govern- 
ing the  struggle  for  existence. 

As  students  of  biology  are  well  aware,  bodily  structures 
that  are  of  no  further  use  to  nature  soon  retrograde,  or 
disappear  almost  completely.  As  an  example,  we  have 
the  cave-dwelling  animals  and  fishes,  which,  despite  the 
fact  that  they  show  every  indication  of  having  once  had 
eyes,  are  now  sightless.  That  is  to  say,  when  the  time 
came  that  they  had  no  further  use  for  eyes,  nature 
permitted  the  sense  of  sight  to  degenerate,  and  at  last, 
even  the  physical  organs  themselves  deteriorated,  until 
only  a  rudimentary  record  was  left  of  the  member  that 
had  once  actually  existed. 

In  this  illustration,  Weismann  finds  an  explanation 
of  the  process  by  which  the  element  of  immortality  was 
lost  by  the  many-celled  organisms.  Being  not  only  of 
no  further  utility,  but  of  positive  danger  to  the  species, 
its  perpetuation  would  have  retarded  the  realisation  of 
the  purpose  of  evolution.  Through  the  operation  of 
the  law  of  natural  selection,  therefore,  death  came  as 
a  beneficent  solution  to  this  great  problem  of  the 
moment,  the  limitation  of  the  population  to  those  indi- 
viduals who  would  be  of  service  in  helping  to  carry  out 
the  scheme  of  the  perpetuation  of  the  species. 

It  must  be  stated  in  this  connection,  however,  that 
Weismann's  theory  is  seriously  questioned  at  the  present 
day,  if  not  altogether  discredited.  Thus  Haeckel,  in  his 
Wonders  of  Life,  pp.  90-101,  points  out  that: — 


10  DEATH 

"  The  immortality  of  the  iinicellulars,  on  which  Weismaun  has 
laid  so  much  stress,  can  only  be  sustained  for  a  small  part  of  the 
protists  even  in  his  own  sense — namely,  for  those  which  simply 
propagate  by  cleavage,  the  chromacea  and  bacteria  among  the 
monera,  the  diatomes  and  paulotomes  amona:  the  protophyta,  and 
a  part  of  the  infusoria  and  rhizopods  among  the  protozoa.  Strictly 
speaking,  the  individual  life  is  destroyed  when  a  cell  splits  into 
daughter  cells.  One  might  reply  with  Weismann,  that  in  this 
case  the  dividing  unicellular  organism  lives  on  as  a  whole  in  its 
offspring,  and  that  we  have  no  corpse,  no  dead  remains  of  the 
living  matter  left  behind.  But  that  is  not  true  of  the  majority 
of  the  protozoa.  In  the  highly-developed  ciliata  the  chief  nucleus 
is  lost,  and  there  must  be  from  time  to  time  a  conjunction  of  two 
cells  and  a  mutual  fertilisation  of  their  secondary  nuclei  before 
there  can  be  any  further  multiplication  by  simple  cleavage.  How- 
ever, in  most  of  the  sporozoa  and  rhizopoda,  which  generally 
propagate  by  spore  formation,  only  one  portion  of  the  unicellular 
organism  is  used  for  this  ;  the  other  portion  dies,  and  forms  a 
'  corpse.'  ..." 

The  fact  is  that  each  inetazoon  consists  of  many 
successive  generations  of  cells — it  really  is  a  cell  cycle 
— and  can  only  be  homologised  with  a  cycle  of  pro- 
tozoan generations,  not  with  any  single  protozoan,  which 
is  but  a  single  cell.  Hence  it  follows  that  the  death 
of  an  individual  protozoan  is  not  homologous  with  the 
death  of  an  individual  multicellular  organism.  Weis- 
mann committed  the  fundamental  error  of  assuming  the 
complete  homology  of  the  two  forms  of  death,  and  thus 
reached  the  false  conclusion  that  protozoa  are  all 
certainly  potentially  immortal. 

E.  Maupas  contended  that  there  is  a  distinct  loss  of 
vitality  in  protozoa  in  the  course  of  successive  genera- 
tions, and  that  conjugation  must  occur  at  some  stage  to 
effect  rejuvenescence.  G.  N.  Calkins  {Studies  in  the  Life- 
History  of  Protozoa)  takes  the  same  view — that  the 
development   of  the   protozoa   is   cyclical ;    and   this   is 


SCIENTIFIC  ASPECT  OF  LIFE  AND  DEATH    11 

further  supported  in  a  recent  paper  by  M.  Hartmann, 
who  also  contends  that  natural  death  does  occur  among 
the  protozoa. 

It  would  seem,  therefore,  that  the  general  trend  ot 
science  is  in  the  direction  of  disproving  this  funda- 
mental conception  of  Weismann ;  and  we  shall  have  to 
reconstruct  our  universe  accordingly,  and  recast  any 
system  of  philosophy  that  may  have  been  founded  on 
his  theory  of  the  natural  immortality  of  protozoa. 

When  we  come  to  speak  of  death,  moreover,  we  must 
be  very  sure  that  we  understand  our  terms  accurately, 
as  much  confusion  has  always  arisen  because  of  in- 
accurate definition  in  all  the  sciences  no  less  than  in 
philosophy  and  metaphysics.  We  must  be  very  sure  as 
to  just  what  we  mean  by  "  death  "  before  we  can  under- 
take to  argue  about  it ;  and  there  are  some  very  loose 
conceptions  afloat  which  it  would  be  well  to  check  at  the 
outset  of  the  investigation.     Let  us  see  what  these  are. 

When  we  cut  off  a  chicken's  head,  we  say  that  the 
chicken  is  "  dead " ;  its  conscious  life  is  extinguished, 
and  if  it  continues  to  move,  or  even  to  run  about  the  yard, 
as  it  does  sometimes,  we  do  not  assume  for  that  reason 
that  any  "  life  "  still  remains  in  the  chicken,  but  rather 
that  "  reflex  action "  causes  these  phenomena.  On  the 
other  hand,  if  we  pluck  a  rose  it  keeps  its  freshness  for 
several  days,  and,  until  that  rose  has  withered  and  lost 
its  freshness  and  beauty  entirely,  we  do  not  say  that 
the  rose  is  "  dead."  In  the  one  case,  w^e  assume  that 
death  has  taken  place  instantaneously ;  in  the  other, 
that  death  d-bes  not  take  place  for  several  days. 
Why  is  this  ? 

The  difficulty  arises  from  this  fact.  There  are  in 
reality  two  kinds  of  death,  which  are  confused  in  the 
public    mind,    until    only    one    death    is    recognised — a 


12  DEATH 

compound  of  these  two.  And  yet,  to  keep  the  problem 
perfectly  clear,  it  is  very  essential  that  these  two  kinds 
of  death  should  be  kept  strictly  apart,  and  in  no  wise 
confused.  Only  in  that  way  can  the  problem  be  under- 
stood. Let  us  take  the  two  instances  that  we  have  given, 
and  with  them,  as  examples,  see  if  we  cannot  make  this 
problem  somewhat  clearer,  and  distinguish  the  two,  so 
that  there  shall  be  no  more  confusion  upon  this  point. 

When  the  chicken's  head  was  cut  off*,  its  conscious 
life  came  to  a  termination  at  that  moment.  It  is 
probable  that  the  subsequent  movements  ive^^e  purely 
reflex,  and  not  in  any  way  the  result  of  conscious  action 
and  volition.  The  conscious  life  of  the  chicken  ended  at 
that  moment  therefore.  Bat  the  hocly,  the  cells,  and  tissues 
of  the  chicken  did  not  die  at  that  time.  The  body  of  the 
chicken — the  tissues — lived  on  for  several  days,  and  not 
until  the  last  remnant  of  vitality  had  departed  could  we 
say  that  the  bird  was  dead.  That  is  to  say,  the  tissues 
of  the  body  continued  to  live  on  for  several  days  after  the 
conscious  life  of  the  bird  had  ceased.  This  tissue  or 
cell-life,  the  life  of  the  body,  is  technically  known  as 
"  somatic  life,"  as  distinct  from  conscious  or  mental  life. 
Now,  in  the  case  of  the  rose,  we  do  not  as  a  rule  say 
that  it  is  "  dead  "  until  somatic  death  has  taken  place. 
It  is  probable  (to  us)  that  the  "  conscious "  life  of  the 
rose  did  come  to  a  termination  at  its  plucking  ;  at  that 
moment  its  ''  conscious  "  life,  so  far  as  it  can  be  said  to 
have  one,  came  to  an  end,  while  its  somatic  life  did  not. 
Since  the  rose  does  not  show  its  mental  life  in  the  same 
way  that  a  chicken  does,  however,  it  is  very  difficult 
to  prove  this  fact,  and  doubtless  many  would  contend 
that  no  such  conscious  life  exists  at  all.  It  is  a 
question  almost  incapable  of  proof,  but  it  has  always 
appeared  to  us  that  by  analogy  there  must  be  some  sort 
of  conscious  life  that  is   terminated  at  the   moment  of 


SCIENTIFIC  ASPECT  OF  LIFE  AND  DEATH    13 

picking  the  flower.  At  all  events,  these  examples  will 
help  to  clear  up  this  problem,  and  enable  us  to  distin- 
guish the  two  kinds  of  death — the  conscious  and  the 
somatic  —  which  must  be  kept  carefully  in  mind 
throughout   the   following   discussion.^ 

While  science  has,  however,  been  unable  to  arrive  at 
a  positive  conclusion  regarding  the  origin  or  nature  of 
death,  it  is  by  no  means  so  difiicult  to  determine  the 
probable  bounds  or  limitations  to  the  duration  of  life. 
Omitting  those  instances  that  depend  upon  tradition 
for  their  verification,  or  that  cannot  be  authenticated 
because  of  our  inability  to  fix  the  unit  of  time  used  in 
making  the  calculations,  or  for  any  other  reason,  we 
occasionally  find  cases  that  show  that  the  scriptural 
limitation  of  "  threescore  years  and  ten  "  falls  far  short  of 
representing  the  greatest  possible  length  of  physical  exist- 
ence in  man.  Even  to-day  the  death  of  a  centenarian  is 
not  an  unknown  occurrence.  At  the  same  time,  this 
question  of  human  longevity  is  a  much  disputed  one, 
and  many  facts  have  to  be  taken  into  consideration 
when  estimating  the  evidential  value  of  such  cases,  and 
particularly  the  historic  cases.  Leaving  out  of  account, 
for  the  time  being,  the  Biblical  records,  there  are  certain 
historical  cases  that  have  been  quoted  time  and  time  again 
in  proof  of  the  possible  limit  of  man's  life ;  but  these 
historic  examples  are,  strangely  enough,  very  rarely  in- 
vestigated. This  is  to  be  regretted,  for  such  cases,  almost 
without  exception,  when  closely  inquired  into,  are  found 
to  rest  upon  totally  inadequate  evidence.  Mr.  William 
J.    Thoms   investigated    a   number   of   such   cases    very 

1  A  tissue  is  said  to  ''die''  when  it  loses  permanently  its  power  of 
responding  to  its  appropriate  stimuli.  The  brain  and  nervous  system  die, 
in  man  and  warm-blooded  animals,  at  the  moment  of  somatic  death  ; 
gland  tissue  dies  very  soon  after.  Smooth  muscle  retains  its  irritability 
forty-five  minutes,  skeletal  muscle  some  hours,  after  death. 


14  DEATH 

uiinutely,  going  into  the  histories  of  the  cases  with 
extreme  care,  and  pubHshed  the  results  of  his  investi- 
gations in  a  book  entitled,  Human  Longevity :  Its  Facts 
and  Its  Fictions,  &c.  The  author  shows  us  how  careless 
statements  are  frequently  the  cause  of  mistakes  that  go 
for  a  hundred  years  or  more  before  they  are  corrected, 
if  indeed  they  ever  are.  Mr.  Thoms  points  out  to  us 
several  sources  of  error,  any  of  which  might  have 
vitiated  the  results  in  many  instances.  Mistaken 
identity  may  have  taken  place — two  people  of  the 
same  name  having  lived  in  a  certain  parish,  &c. 
Again,  a  married  couple  may  have  a  son  who  dies. 
They  have  a  second  son  a  number  of  years  later,  and 
they  give  this  son  the  same  name  as  the  first  child. 
These  two  get  confused  in  memory  and  in  record,  and  it 
is  generally  the  second,  or  even  the  third  and  youngest 
son  that  lives  to  a  good  old  age ;  and  he,  being 
confused  with  the  first  or  second  child  of  like  name, 
becomes  celebrated  for  being  many  years  older  than 
he  really  is. 

A  number  of  such  sources  of  error  are  shown,  and 
backed  up  by  several  cases  in  which  these  errors  had 
doubtless  taken  place.  The  inaccuracy  of  baptismal  certifi- 
cates, tombstones,  &c.,  is  also  illustrated.  Mr.  Thoms 
then  examined  in  great  detail  the  famous  cases  of  Henry 
Jenkins,  Thomas  Parr,  and  the  Countess  of  Desmond. 
Original  trials,  documents,  army  and  navy  registers,  parish 
registers,  &c.,  were  examined  in  every  instance.^  The 
cases  of  Parr,  Jenkins,  and  that  of  the  Countess  of 
Desmond,  when  examined,  were  found  to  be  resting  on 

*  Among  other  interesting  documents  in  this  connection,  the  reader 
may  consult  Evidcncf.s  of  the  Great  Age  of  Henry  Jenkins,  with  Notes,  rc- 
spectinij  Lonrjcrity  and  Lo7i;/-Lived  Persons.  Bell,  llichmond,  1850.  The 
case  of  old  Thomas  Parr  (who  was  examined  post  mortem  by  Harvey)  is  to 
be  found  in  a  work  entitled,  The  Okie,  Okie,  Very  Oide  Man ;  or.  The  Age 
and  Long  Life  of  Thomas  Parr. 


SCIENTIFIC  ASPECT  OF  LIFE  AND  DEATH    15 

quite  inadequate  proof;  indeed,  there  was  no  proof  at  all, 
that  could  properly  be  called  evidential  !     The   author 
gives  a  number  of  carefully-investigated  cases,  the  results 
of  which  are,  briefly,  as  follows : — Mary  Billings,  reputed 
112  years  old,  proved  to  be  91;  Jonathan  Reeves,  104, 
proved  to  be  80  :  Mary  Downton,  106,  proved  to  be  100  ; 
Joshua  Millar,  111,  proved  to  be  90  ;  Maudit  Baden,  lOG, 
proved  to  be  considerably  less, — how  much  less  is  not 
certain;    Thomas  Geeran,   106,  ditto;   John  Pratt,    106, 
ditto;  George  Fletcher,   108,  proved  to   be   92;  George 
Smith,  105,  proved  to  be  95  ;  Edward  Couch,  110,  proved 
to  be  95;  William  Webb,  105,  proved  to  be  95;  John 
Dawe,  108  or  116,  proved  to  be  87  ;  George  Brewer,  106, 
proved  to  be  98;  Robert  Howlinson,  103,  proved  less; 
Robert  Bowman,  118  or  119,  proved  much  less ;  Frederick 
Lahrbush,  106,  proved  less;  Richard  Purser,  112,  proved 
less;  AVilliam  Bennett,  105,  proved  to  be  95  ;  Mary  Hicks, 
104,  proved  to  be  97;  and  several  others.     The  author 
gives  four  cases,  however,  in  which  the  ages  of  102,  100, 
103,  and  101  had  undoubtedly  been  reached,  and  a  chap- 
ter of  cases  in  which  ages  of  more  than  one  hundred  might 
possibly  be   presumed,   although   the   evidence   was  not 
strong  enough  to  prove  the  fact.     But  after  the  evidence 
adduced  in  the  former  portion  of  the  book,  it  is  certain 
that  all  such  statements,  especially  if  not  backed  up  by 
documentary  evidence,  is  to  be  mistrusted.     Dr.  De  Lacy 
Evans   gives   some   seventy   cases   of   persons   who    had 
apparently  reached  an  age  of  more  than  a  hundred  {Hoio 
to  Prolong  Life :  An  Inqidry  into  the  Cause  of  "  Old  Age  " 
and  ''Natural  Death"  &c.,  pp.  100-121,  London,  1885); 
but  none  of  his  cases  are  well  certified,  and  the  names 
of  several   of  the  discredited  cases  figure    prominently. 
The  same  may  be  said  of  the  collection  of  forty-seven  cases 
given  by  Dr.  Hosmer  Bostwick,  in  his  Inquiry  into  the 
Cause  of  Naticral  Death;  or,  Death  from  Old  Age  (New  York, 


16  DEATH 

1851).  There  is  no  doubt,  however,  that  certain  cases 
of  old  age  do  sometimes  come  up.  So  far  as  we  know, 
Captain  Diamond's  great  age  of  112  years  has  never  been 
disproved.  Metchnikoff  gives  us  the  portrait  of  an  old 
woman  of  105  years  of  age  in  his  Proloiujation  of  Life 
(p.  6) ;  and  it  is  stated,  upon  the  authority  of  Albert 
Kruger,  Superintendent  of  the  Home  of  the  Daughters 
of  Jacob  in  New  York  City,  that  Mrs.  Esther  Davis,  an 
inmate  of   this  institution,   was  in   1908,   115   years   of 


aofe.^ 


It  is  all  the  more  astonishing  that  there  should  be  so 
few  trustworthy  examples  of  old  age,  when  we  take  into 
account  the  fact  that  it  is  all  but  universally  conceded 
that  from  100  to  120  years  should  be  the  normal  limit  of 
life  of  the  individual  man  and  woman.  The  fact  that  so 
few  actually  do  reach  this  age,  proves  conclusively  how 
perverted  are  the  food  and  other  habits  of  the  people. 

Although  we  know,  therefore,  both  from  experience  and 
from  authentic  historical  facts,  that  men  and  women  do 
occasionally  pass  the  centenary  mark,  it  must  be  admitted 
that  such  cases  are  rather  exceptional,  for,  so  far  as 
modern  mortality  statistics  -are  concerned,  the  average 
length  of  human  life  is  nowhere  much  in  excess  of  forty- 
two  years. 

Strictly  speaking,  therefore,  practically  the  only  positive 
fact  that  science  can  teach  us  concerning  death  is  that  it 
is  the  inevitable  fate  of  all  living  things.  The  law  that 
stipulates  that  all  those  who  are  born  must  die  is  now  as 
certain  in  its  operation  as  the  law  of  gravitation.      At 

^  In  his  Philosophy  of  Long  Life  Joan  Finot  has  given  a  number  of  cases 
in  which  men  have  lived  much  Iqnger  than  a  hundred  years,  and  some  of 
them  an  incredible  time ;  but  his  cases  do  not  seem  to  us  to  rest  on  any 
very  secure  basis — many  of  the  old  cases  being  quoted  v^hich  Mr.  Thoms 
had  conclusively  shown  to  be  incorrect.  At  the  same  time,  we  admit  that 
some  of  his  cases  seem  well  established,  while  others  will  be  found  in 
T,  B.  Young's  little  book  On  Centenarians  (London,  1899). 


SCIENTIFIC  ASPECT  OF  LIFE  AND  DEATH    17 

this  point,  however,  materiahstic  science  stops,  leaving  the 
probable  fate  of  the  individuality,  or  thinking-part  of  man, 
an  unsolved  problem.  As  to  this  "  soul-part "  of  being, 
in  fact,  science  has  even  questioned  its  very  existence. 
To  the  ordinary  scientist,  death  is  a  door  that  closes  upon 
consciousness  as  the  breath  leaves  the  body.  If  there  is 
any  existence  behind  that  door,  his  experiments  have 
thrown  no  light  upon  it,  and  the  man  who  is  unwilling  to 
accept  these  negative  conclusions  as  the  last  word  on  this 
subject  must  search  elsewhere  for  the  evidence  in  support 
of  the  hope  that  is  within  him. 


B 


CHAPTER  II 

THE   SIGNS  OF  DEATH 

Many  years  ago  the  Marquis  d'Ourches  offered,  through 
the  Paris  Acaddmie  de  M4decine,  two  prizes,  one  of  twenty 
thousand  francs,  the  other  of  five  thousand  francs,  for 
some  simple,  certain  sign  of  death.  The  secretary,  Dr. 
Roger,  reported  on  the  competition.  One  hundred  and 
two  essays  were  sent  in,  but  none  was  deemed  worthy  the 
first  prize !  The  second  was  divided  between  six  com- 
petitors. Five  hundred  francs  was  given  to  M.  de  Cordue 
for  his  observations  on  the  effects  of  the  flame  of  a  candle 
on  the  pulp  of  the  finger.  M.  Larcher  was  rewarded  for 
his  observations  on  the  eye  after  death.  (As  the  result 
of  examining  nine  hundred  patients,  he  found  the  occur- 
rence of  a  shaded  or  greyish  spot,  first  on  the  outer  portion 
of  the  sclerotica,  and  gradually  involving  the  whole  sur- 
face.) M.  Poncet  received  an  honourable  mention  for  his 
observations  on  the  discoloration  of  the  fundus  of  the 
eye ;  M.  Molland,  for  his  observations  on  cadaveric  livi- 
dity ;  and  MM.  Bouchut  and  Linas  for  their  observations 
on  the  temperature  of  the  body.  But  nothing  definite 
and  decisive  was  discovered  ;  and  almost  the  same  might 
be  said  to  hold  good  to-day. 

Passing  in  review  the  various  signs  of  death,  M.  Brouardel 
has  this  to  say : — 

"  The  comhination  of  signs  of  death  gives  us  almost  complete  cer- 
tainty of  death.  .  .  .  But  I  believe  that  it  is  right  to  remain  in  a 
state  of  philosophic  doubt ;  we  know  that  apparent  death  may  last 
for  a  longer  or  shorter  time,  and  that  in  three  cases  at  least  .  .  . 

18 


THE  SIGNS  OF  DEATH  19 

persons  considered  to  be  dead  have  been  called  to  life.  .  .  .  The 
verification  of  death  should  therefore  always  be  entrusted  to  a 
physician,  who  alone  is  competent  to  estimate  the  value  of  the 
different  signs  that  we  have  just  been  examining.  ...  I  believe 
that  accidents  will  then  be,  if  not  impossible,  at  any  rate  infinitely 
rare,  and  I  am  obliged  to  add  that  though  there  is  a  great  improba- 
bility of  a  living  person  being  buried  alive  under  those  conditions, 
in  which  actual  death  is,  or  rather  is  not,  complete — still,  it  is 
impossible  to  assert  that  the  direful  contingency  might  not  happen  " 
(pp.  61,  62). 

1.  General  Signs. 

Let  us,  then,  see  what  these  signs  are,  which  are  sup- 
posed to  render  death  certain,  and  thus  prevent  these 
unfortunate  "  accidents,"  or  this  "  direful  contingency." 

In  death,  intelligence  is  absent ;  but  so  it  is  in  trance 
and  syncope. 

In  death,  insensibility  is  complete ;  but  it  is  also  prac- 
tically complete  in  certain  cases  of  hysteria  in  which 
there  is  complete  anaesthesia.  Surface  insensibility  is 
complete,  and  the  patient  does  not  react  to  the  most 
painful  tests,  on  occasion.  All  sense  of  hearing  and  smell 
are  also  absent.  The  eye  presents  some  very  interesting 
tests.  It  was  noticed  that  there  was  an  immediate 
lessening  of  the  tension  of  the  globe  of  the  eye,  just 
after  death,  owing  to  the  fact  that  the  blood-vessels  were 
emptied  of  blood.  But  this  proves,  merely,  that  the 
heart  has  stopped  beating — not  that  death  has  taken 
place ;  and  we  know^  that  persons  can  often  be  revived 
long  after  the  heart  has  ceased  to  beat.  Bouchut  con- 
tends that  atropine  and  eserine  have  no  effect  after 
death.  The  pupil  dilates  at  the  moment  of  death,  but 
afterwards  returns  to  its  normal  condition  and  size,  and 
the  iris  is  thrown  into  folds.  It  is  also  asserted  that  the 
eyeball  is  harder  after  death  than  during  life. 


20  DEATH 

One  very  characteristic  sign  is  the  sclerotic  speck  that 
appears  after  death ;  the  conjunctiva  also  assumes  a 
brown  hue.  Commenting  on  these  signs,  Dr.  Hartmann 
wisely  remarked,  "  All  these  signs  prove  that  the  circu- 
lation has  stopped ;  not  that  it  cannot  be  started  again." 

It  will  be  of  interest  to  refer  here  to  a  peculiar  fact, 
the  explanation  of  which  is  still  somewhat  uncertain, 
but  which  caused  a  tremendous  sensation  some  years 
ago  when  it  was  first  made  public.  It  was  announced 
at  the  time  that  in  persons  dying  suddenl}^  the  eye  pre- 
served the  impression  of  whatever  object  was  in  front  of 
it  at  that  moment.  It  was  suggested  that  murderers 
might  be  traced  in  this  manner — since  it  is  to  be  sup- 
posed that  the  murderer  would  be  the  last  object  seen 
by  the  murdered  man,  in  most  instances.  The  case  was 
somewhat  overstated,  and  many  persons  totally  disbelieve 
in  the  possibility  of  the  fact  at  all.  There  is,  however, 
some  ground  for  the  belief.  Kiihne  of  Heidelberg  placed 
a  grating  in  front  of  a  rabbit,  then  killed  the  animal 
rapidly,  removed  its  eye,  exposed  the  retina,  and  photo- 
graphed it.  The  cross-bars  of  the  grating  were  clearly 
seen  in  the  print.  In  the  case  of  a  more  complicated 
object,  such  as  a  table  or  a  chair,  the  outline  was  much 
more  blurred  and  indistinct,  but  yet  recognisable.  In 
such  cases  the  animal  must  be  killed  immediately,  and 
the  retina  photographed  very  soon  after  death.  For 
these  reasons,  it  would  be  difficult  to  obtain  definite 
results  in  the  human  being.  Certainly,  very  little  trace 
of  any  scene  would  be  found  on  the  retina  twenty-four 
hours  after  the  death  of  the  subject.  This  is  a  question 
of  great  importance  that  should  be  followed  up  closely ; 
but,  until  some  of  the  prejudices  of  the  public  are  over- 
come, it  is  unlikely  that  any  definite  results  will  be 
obtained  in  this  possibly  fruitful  field. 

At   death   the   immobility  of  the   body  becomes   pro- 


I 


THE  SIGNS  OF  DEATH  21 

nounced,  and  the  lower  jaw  falls  on  to  the  breast.  But 
these  signs  are  not  constant,  and  it  has  been  pointed 
out  that  in  tetanus  and  in  hysteria  the  mouth  may 
remain  closed.  Complete  rigidity  of  the  corpse  may 
sometimes  be  found  before  rigor  mortis  supervenes.  After 
death,  as  the  body  cools,  the  muscles,  especially  of  the 
face,  continue  to  contract  in  odd  ways,  and  sometimes 
the  face  will  be  pulled  into  various  shapes,  and  give  the 
appearance,  perhaps,  of  the  patient  having  died  in  the 
greatest  agony.  Such  may  not  have  been  the  case 
at  all ;  the  death  may  have  been  perfectly  painless. 
Richardson  attached  considerable  weight  to  the  fact  that 
live  bodies  usually  respond  to  an  electric  stirnulus,  while 
dead  bodies  do  not.  But  this  test  also  has  been  found 
inconclusive. 

Respiration  ceases  at  death ;  yet  the  respiratory  test  is 
quite  variable  in  its  results.  In  some  cases  the  patient 
may  be  in  a  trance,  and  appear  not  to  breathe  at  all, 
and  yet  be  alive.  On  the  other  hand,  a  patient  may  be 
dead,  and  the  gases  moving  about  within  his  body  give 
every  appearance  of  life.  The  old  test  of  holding  a 
mirror  to  the  lips  is  known  to  all ;  the  idea  of  placing  a 
glass  full  of  water  on  the  epigastrium  of  the  patient  is 
not  so  well  known.  If  this  overflows  the  patient  is 
supposed  to  be  alive ;  if  not,  he  is  dead !  The  test 
is  inconclusive  for  the  reasons  indicated  above. 

Brouardel,  in  his  excellent  manual  on  Death  and 
Sudden  Death,  thus  enumerates  the  sources  of  error  in 
attempting  to  assure  oneself  of  the  fact  of  death  by 
observations  upon  the  circulation : — 

"  Bouclmt,  who  has  studied  all  these  questions  with  great  care, 
has  riglitly  said  that  one  must  not  be  satisfied  with  feeling  the 
pulse,  but  must  go  higher  and  consult  the  heart  also.  In  a 
memoir  published  by  him,  and  submitted  to  the  Academy  of 
Science,  he  states  that  an  interruption  of  the  action  of  the  heart. 


22  DEATH 

lasting  for  two  minutes,  was  sufficient  to  render  the  diagnosis  of 
death  certain.  Andral,  who  was  appointed  to  report  on  Bouchut's 
memoir,  believed  that  this  interruption  should  be  prolonged  for 
five  minutes.  Later  on,  he  was  obliged  to  acknowledge  that  even 
this  length  of  time  was  inadequate,  since  in  the  interval  he  had 
met  with  a  woman  who  returned  to  life  some  hours  after  the 
action  of  the  heart  had  ceased  to  be  perceptible ;  it  is  true  that  a 
few  contractures  could  be  perceived  from  time  to  time,  but  they 
vanished  to  reappear  later. 

"  Bouchut  thinks  that  the  heart  should  be  listened  to  for  lialf- 
an-hour.  There  are  at  least  two  sources  of  error  here.  You 
cannot  listen  to  a  heart  for  half-an-hour  continuously.  Try  to  do 
so ;  in  five  or  six  minutes  you  will  hear  buzzings  and  murmurs  of 
all  sorts,  and  at  last  you  will  hear  the  beating  of  your  oivn  heart. 
A  second  source  of  error  is  as  follows :  When  an  animal  is  dying, 
and  you  practise  auscultation,  you  hear  very  plainly  the  two  sounds 
of  the  heart,  then  only  one  sound,  which  presently  disappears  also. 
If  the  animal  is  opened  the  heart  is  found  still  beating.  There- 
fore, it  is  essential  that  the  heart  should  beat  with  a  certain  degree 
of  energy  in  order  that  its  beats  should  be  heard"  (pp.  50,  51). 

He  also  points  out  that  the  keenness  of  hearing  is  not 
alike  in  all. 

If  the  absence  of  the  heart-beat  cannot  be  considered 
a  certain  sign  of  death,  perhaps  some  of  the  other  signs 
connected  with  the  circulation  might  ?  If  the  vein  be 
opened  immediately  after  death  no  blood  will  issue 
therefrom ;  but  blood  will  issue  in  the  course  of  a  few 
hours  if  the  wound  be  left  open.  The  arteries  contract, 
and  force  the  blood  through  the  capillaries  into  the 
veins.  Further,  the  gases  formed  within  the  body  force 
the  blood  to  the  surface,  so  that,  if  the  skin  be  cut, 
blood  will  sometimes  flow.  This  was  the  origin  of  many 
of  the  stories  of  vampires  to  which  Ave  refer  elsewhere.'^ 
Coagulation  is  also  a  very  uncertain  sign.     Ligature  of  the 

^  See  Appendix  A. 


THE  SIGNS  OF  DEATH  23 

finger,  cupping  and  leeching,  have  been  resorted  to ;  but 
the  same  objection  may  be  raised  to  all,  viz.,  the  fact 
that  the  heart's  action  has  ceased  does  not  guarantee 
that  it  cannot  be  set  in  motion  again. 

After  death,  little  livid  spots  appear  on  the  surface  of 
the  body.  They  are  known  as  cadaveric  sigillations  or 
lividity,  and  are  caused  by  the  exudation  of  blood  into 
cellular  tissue  from  the  veins.  It  is  an  almost  invariable 
sign.  Dr.  Holland,  who  examined  15,146  cases,  never 
found  it  absent  once.  Nevertheless,  it  may  be  absent 
in  cases  where  there  has  been  abundant  haemorrhage 
before  death ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  they  may  appear 
before  death  in  certain  cases — in  cholera,  urtemia,  and 
asphyxia.     This  sign  is  also,  therefore,  inconclusive. 

The  temperature  post-mortem  has  been  considered  a 
very  important  sign ;  but  it  is  a  very  uncertain  one. 
When  the  surrounding  temperature  is  high,  the  body 
may  take  a  very  long  time  to  cool,  though  death  may 
have  taken  place ;  and  certain  diseases  also  hinder  the 
cooling  of  the  body.  On  the  other  hand  the  body  may 
cool  considerably  in  trance,  and  certain  states  of  a 
kindred  nature,  and  yet  life  be  preserved  and  revived. 

In  slow  deaths  cooling  is  a  gradual  process,  and  varies 
much  in  rapidity.  The  trunk  may  remain  warm,  while 
the  limbs  are  cold.  The  cooling  is  slow  if  the  body  is 
covered  with  warm  clothing,  or  bed  clothes.  Wool  is  a 
bad  conductor.  The  bodies  of  young  persons,  which  have 
generally  a  subcutaneous  layer  of  fat,  take  longer  to  cool 
than  those  of  thin,  old  persons.  In  wasting  diseases  the 
heat  is  low  in  the  last  hours  before  death.  It  has  been 
supposed  that  cooling  takes  place  more  rapidly  in  cases 
of  death  from  hiemorrhage,  but  this  is  rarely  true.  In 
all  cases  of  death  by  suffocation,  cooling  seems  to  be 
retarded.  Casper's  rule  as  to  the  cooling  of  the  body  is 
as  follows :  ''  A  body  found  on  the  highway  with  clothes 


24  DEATH 

on  (the  air  being  at  a  medium  temperature),  still  warm, 
has  been  dead  probably  not  more  than  three  hours.  A 
body  found  in  bed  and  still  warm  has  been  dead  at  most 
lor  ten  or  twelve  hours." 

Another  sign  of  death  that  can  sometimes  be  obtained 
is  the  following.  A  patch  of  skin  is  removed,  and,  in  the 
course  of  some  hours,  the  exposed  surface  will  become 
IMTchmcnt-lihe  in  appearance,  and  will  yield  a  sharp  sound 
when  tapped.  AVe  do  not  know  if  this  has  ever  happened 
in  a  case  of  trance ;  and  we  have,  consequently,  nothing 
to  guide  us  in  this  respect. 

A  sign  that  was  for  long  considered  certain  was  that 
oihurning  or  blistering  the  body.  If  a  live  body  be  burned, 
a  blister  will  be  raised,  surrounded  by  a  reddish  areola. 
In  dead  bodies  this  is  supposed  not  to  exist.  But  is 
that  the  case  ?  M.  Brouardel  states  that  blisters  may 
very  readily  be  raised  on  dead  bodies  : — "  Let  a  drop  of 
melted  sealing-wax  fall  on  to  a  limb  that  has  just  been 
amputated,  and  you  will  succeed  in  producing  a  blister." 
The  test  of  burning  is  therefore  a  doubtful  sign.^ 

Dr.  Franz  Hartmann,  in  his  excellent  manual.  Buried 
Alive,  has  summarised  quite  exhaustively  the  various 
signs  of  death.  We  abridge  his  account  of  those  tests 
that  other  authors  have  omitted  to  mention. 

Immobility  of  a  needle  stuck  in  the  pericardium  : — This 
indicates  that  the  heart  has  ceased  to  boat ;  not  that  the 
person  is  beyond  recovery. 

Emptiness  of  the  centred  artery  of  the  rethia ;  disap- 
pearance of  the  papilla  of  the  optic  nerve ;  discoloration  oj 
the  clioroid  and  retina  ;  interruption  of  the  circidation  of 
the  veins  in  the  retina ;  emptiness  of  the  capillary  vessels  : — 

^  The  author  just  cited  states  that  he  has  found  an  excellent  way  of 
reviving  those  in  syncope  ;  it  is  to  place  a  hammer  just  dipped  in  very  hot 
water  on  the  epigastrium.  Patients  nearly  always  revive.  It  is  doubtful 
if  this  would  succeed  in  every  case,  however — especially  where  the  vitality 
is  very  low  ;  and  indeed  the  author  intimates  that  it  would  not. 


THE  SIGNS  OF  DEATH  25 

All  these  signs  are  open  to  the  objection  just  pointed 
out. 

Corpse-like  face  ;  discoloration  of  the  shin  ;  loss  of  trans- 
parency of  the  hands : — "  These  signs  are  now  so  well 
known  to  be  delusive,  as  to  require  no  further  at- 
tention." Emptiness  of  the  temporal  artery : — This  only 
indicates  that  the  heart  has  lost  the  power  to  send  the 
blood  to  that  artery ;  but  it  is  no  sign  that  it  may  not 
recover  its  strength.  White  and  livid  colouring  at  the 
poijits  of  the  fingers : — An  antiquated  and  misleading 
sim. 

Belctxation  of  the  sphincters  and  the  pupil ;  glazed  eyes  and 
haziness  of  the  cornea  ;  insensibility  of  the  eye  in  regard  to  the 
action  of  a  strong  light ;  bending  of  the  thtcmb  towards  the 
2mlm  of  the  hand : — All  given  up  nowadays  as  unreliable. 

Discqopearance  of  the  elasticity  of  the  muscles — also  takes 
place  in  dropsy  and  other  diseases. 

Non-coagulability  of  the  blood : — Unreliable  ;  in  scurvy 
and  certain  other  diseases  the  blood  remains  incoas^ulable 
for  several  days. 

Absence  of  a  humming  noise  in  the  auscultation  of  the  finger 
joints: — Unreliable.  If  the  finger  is  not  held  in  just  the 
right  position,  nothing  will  be  heard,  even  if  the  patient 
is  alive.  Further,  humming  noises,  internal  noises  in 
the  body  of  the  physician,  &c.,  are  apt  to  be  mistaken 
for  the  sounds  going  on  in  the  body  of  the  patient. 

Galvanism  has  been  considered  sufficient  to  furnish 
a  test  that  is  certain.  Irritability  is  extinguished  first  in 
the  left  ventricle;  then  in  the  intestines  and  stomach, 
next  in  the  bladder,  afterwards  in  the  right  ventricle, 
then  in  the  oesophagus,  and  after  that  in  the  iris.  The 
muscles  of  the  trunk  finally  give  way — the  extremities 
and  the  auricles.  The  collapsed  edge  of  a  wound  in 
a  dead  body,  in  distinction  from  a  gushing  wound  in 
a  living  one,  is  the  result  of  a  peculiar  irritability — the 


26  DEATH 

extinction  of  which  is  one  of  the  indications  of  death. 
Flaccidity  is  an  uncertain  sign  of  death ;  putrefaction  is 
unequivocal. 

Within  recent  years,  two  or  three  additional  tests  have 
been  devised.  X-ray  machines  have  been  employed  to 
ascertain  whether  any  vital  action  was  taking  place 
within  the  body.  It  was  found  that,  if  all  the  internal 
functioning  had  come  to  a  complete  standstill — bowels, 
liver,  lungs,  heart,  &c. — the  shadow  cast  on  the  screen 
would  come  out  clear  and  distinct ;  if,  on  the  other 
hand,  some  of  these  organs  were  working  (and  conse- 
quently moving)  the  outline  or  shadow  would  be  blurred 
and  indistinct.  We  do  not  know  to  what  extent  this  test 
has  been  carried;  and  its  value  and  reliability  would 
depend  (1)  upon  the  clearness  of  the  shadow;  and  (2), 
upon  the  extent  to  which  the  internal  organs  can  sus- 
pend their  functioning,  in  such  states  as  trance,  and  yet 
life  be  present,  or  possibly  recalled.  We  must  always 
remember  that  the  entire  vital  machinery  might  stop, 
for  some  considerable  time,  and  yet  be  enabled  to  resume 
its  functioning.  This  fact  must  be  taken  into  considera- 
tion when  discussing  this  test. 

Still  more  lately,  Dr.  Elmer  Gates  has  published  an 
article  in  the  Annals  of  Psychical  Science  (June  1906), 
entitled,  "  On  the  Transparency  of  the  Animal  Body  to 
Electric  and  Light  Waves :  As  a  Test  of  Death  and  a 
New  Mode  of  Diagnosis,  and  a  Probable  New  Method  of 
Psj'chic  Research."     He  says  in  part : — 

"  Several  years  ago  ...  I  discovered  that  certain  wave  lengths 
of  electric  waves  (not  X-rays  or  ultra-violet  light)  pass  more  freely 
through  a  body  of  a  dead  than  of  a  living  organism,  and  I  pro- 
posed this  as  a  test  of  death.  This  greater  transparency  at  death 
I  found  to  be  due  to  the  absence  of  the  normal  electric  currents, 
which  are  always  present  in  functionally  active  nerves  and  muscles. 

.   .  When  the  body  is  alive,  it  is  a  bundle  of  electric  currents,  and 


THE  SIGNS  OF  DEATH  27 

electric  waves  cannot  pass  through  these  currents ;  but  when  they 
cease,  at  death,  the  body  becomes  transparent  to  electric  waves." 

How  far  these  electric  currents  would  be  reduced  in 
trance  and  kindred  states,  is  a  matter  for  further  inquiry. 
The  objections  previously  raised  must  not  be  lost  sight 
of  in  this  connection. 

There  is  yet  another  test  of  death  of  a  somewhat 
"  occult "  character,  which  its  votaries  declare  infallible  1 
It  is  the  following  : — 

"  The  Aura  after  Death. — It  will  readily  be  understood  that 
death  produces  an  immediate  great  change  in  the  human  auras. 
All  the  higher  principles,  together  with  the  auric  egg  that  envelopes 
them,  disappear,  leaving  the  doomed  material  body  with  only  its 
lifelong  and  inseparable  etheric  double  floating  over  it ;  the  caloric 
aura  gradually  ceases  with  the  disappearance  of  animal  heat ;  the 
pranic  aura,  which  had  begun  to  fade  before  the  actual  dissolution, 
turns  to  an  ashen-grey  light ;  all  the  electric  emanations,  already 
broken  up  during  the  sickness,  cease ;  the  magnetic  flow  alone  con- 
tinues, though  in  a  sluggish  and  stationary  manner ;  the  Tatwic 
ribbons  lose  their  colour,  leaving  only  dead,  colourless  lines,  as  in 
mineral  matter,  whereby  it  can  be  said  that  the  auric  manifestation 
which  remains  around  the  body  is  only  that  which  belongs  to  the 
dead  material  compounds,  until  decomposition  sets  in.  Then  the 
aiu:ic  effluvium  again  becomes  alive,  and  assumes  the  aspects  and 
hues  of  the  new  lives  that  issue  out  of  death.  Thus,  the  study  of 
the  human  aura  will  bring  out  new  and  more  reliable  signs  of  real 
death,  because  to  a  psychic  sight,  the  aura  of  a  person  in  coma  or 
cataleptic  trance — however  well  this  may  otherwise  simulate  death 
— will  never  be  mistaken  for  that  of  a  body  in  which  life  is  really 
and  positively  extinct.  .  .  .  "  ^ 

Without  discussing  the  reality  of  these  phenomena  in 
this  place,  it  may  only  be  said  that  the  diflPiculty  of  find- 
ing a  seer  possessing  the  requisite  psychic  sight  might  be 

^  2Vte  Human  Aura,  by  A.  Marques,  pp.  5j,  oG. 


28  DEATH 

sufficiently  difficult  to  render  this  method  of  diagnosis 
impractical  under  all  ordinary  circumstances  !  Of  course, 
such  theories  would  have  to  be  rigorously  demonstrated 
before  science  could  even  tolerate  them  for  a  moment, 
in  a  life  and  death  problem  such  as  this.  It  is  hardly 
necessary  to  add  that  this  demonstration  has  so  far  failed 
to  appear  either  in  the  desired  quality  or  quantity. 

2.  Odor  Mortis;  or,  the  Smell  of  Death. 

In  the  Cincinnati  Clinic  of  September  4,  1875,  was 
published  a  paper  on  "  Odor  Mortis ;  or,  the  Smell  of 
Death,"  read  by  Dr.  A.  B.  Isham  before  the  Cincinnati 
Academy  of  Medicine,  August  30,  1875.  The  paper  was 
based  upon  observation  made  while  an  inmate  of  one  of 
the  surgical  wards  of  the  Stanton  Hospital,  Washington, 
during  the  summer  of  1863,  as  well  as  upon  instances  in 
which  the  "  odor  "  had  been  met  with  in  private  practice. 
The  character  of  the  odour  was  muskiferous,  yet  it  appre- 
ciably, though  almost  indescribably,  differed  from  that  of 
musk.  In  this  paper  he  presented  two  recent  instances 
where  this  odour  attracted  notice,  together  with  some  new 
observations  concerning  it. 

Instance  1. — July  13,  1878,  on  the  eve  of  Dr.  Bartho- 
lomew's departure  for  Europe,  Dr.  Isham  was  requested 

to  assume  charge  of  his  patient,  Mr. .     The  patient 

was  unconscious,  with  irregular,  noisy  respiration,  with 
only  a  feeble  trace  of  pulse,  indistinguishable  at  times, 
and  ^V2LS  dying  slowly  from  effusion  within  the  membrane 
of  the  brain,  the  result  of  chronic  alcoholism.  He  was 
with  him  through  the  middle  of  the  night,  and  during 
this  time  he  noticed  upon  his  right  hand  a  smell  resem- 
bling that  of  musk.  This  hand  was  exclusively  used  in 
examining  the  patient's  pulse  and  in  noting  the  tempera- 
ture of  the  body.     Earlier  in  the  night  there  had  been 


THE  SIGNS  OF  DEATH  29 

no  smell  upon  it.  The  left  hand  acquired  the  same 
smell  from  handling  the  body,  and  it  was  also  communi- 
cated to  the  handle  of  a  fan  held  in  the  hand.  A  gentle- 
man from  Chicago,  who  had  volunteered  as  a  night 
watcher,  and  whose  attention  had  been  called  to  the  odour 
without  any  suggestion  as  to  its  character,  promptly 
distinguished  it.  The  ladies  of  the  household  did  not 
use  musk,  and  no  perfumery  had  been  in  the  room  or 
about  the  patient.  Neither  had  Isham  handled  nor  come 
in  contact  with  anything  other  than  the  patient  from 
which  the  odour  could  have  been  derived.  Death 
occurred  thirty-three  hours  later. 

Instance  2. — About  midnight.  May  21,  1879,  Dr.  Isham 
was  called  to  see  Mrs.  G.  She  had  several  months  pre- 
viously been  under  his  care  with  acute  duodenitis,  but 
with  impaired  digestion  and  defective  assimilation ;  but 
she  had  subsequently  passed  into  the  hands  of  an  irregular 
practitioner.  He  found  her  in  articulo  mortis,  with  general 
anasarca,  the  result  of  blood  dilution.  Upon  entering 
the  room  there  was  a  plainly  perceptible  musky  odour. 
There  was  no  musk  about  the  house,  nor  had  any  other 
perfumery  been  employed.  Death  ensued  in  about  half- 
an-hour. 

The  smell,  as  stated,  was  closely  allied  to  that  of  musk, 
yet  the  impression  on  the  olfactory  organs  was  more 
delicately  subtle.  Besides,  there  was  an  indescribable 
feature  pertaining  to  it  which  seemed  to  impress  the 
respiratory  sense  and  trouble  respiration — a  vague  sensa- 
tion of  an  irrespirable  or  noxious  gas.  To  the  convales- 
cent loungers  of  sharp  olfactory  sense  about  the  wards  of 
Stanton  Hospital  the  smell  was  familiar,  and  was  termed 
the  death  smell.  It  was  not  uncommon  to  hear  the  expres- 
sion, "  Some  one  is  dying,  for  I  smell  him  !  "  ^ 

It    was   rare    to    find    the    odour   widely  ditfused,  and 

^  See  Appendix  E. 


30  DEATH 

where  it  appeared  to  be  it  was  probably  due  to  a  con- 
tinuance of  the  first  impression  upon  the  olfactory  organs. 
As  commonly  encountered,  it  has  suggested  the  idea  of 
gaseous  aggregation  or  body  containing  odoriferous  par- 
ticles possessing  an  attraction  for  each  other,  and  so 
held  together.  In  the  hospital  ward,  while  present  in 
one  place  it  was  not  experienced  in  another  slightly 
removed.  It  also  quickly  disappeared  from  the  first 
place — probably  moved  along  by  atmospheric  waves. 
Thevapour  in  which  the  odorous  molecules  were  suspended 
appeared,  in  some  instances  at  least,  heavier  than  the 
atmospheric  air.  Thus,  Dr.  Isham  had  sometimes  recog- 
nised the  smell  in  lower  hallways — the  patient  occupying 
the  upper  portion  of  the  house;  and  in  "  Instance  1," 
already  detailed,  it  was  only  detected  on  handling  the 
body.  This  affords  one  explanation  why  it  may  not 
claim  more  recognition.  From  its  heaviness  it  subsides, 
and  does  not  enter  the  nose.  Other  reasons  why  it  may 
escape  attention  are,  that  the  olfactory  sensibilities  may 
be  blunted  by  long  continuance  in  an  ill-ventilated,  bad- 
smelling  sick-room  ;  or  the  air  currents  may  carry  the 
odour  in  a  direction  not  favourable  to  observation. 

The  only  mention  of  an  odour  which  might  be  analo- 
gous is  reported  by  Dr.  Badgely,  of  Montreal,  in  a  report 
on  "  Irish  Emigrant  Fever."  It  is  thus  quoted  by  Drake 
in  his  work  on  the  "  Principal  Diseases  of  the  Interior 
Valley  of  America,"  as  taken  from  the  British  Medical 
Journal : — 

"  I  hazard  the  idea  that  the  ammoniacal  odour  emanating  from 
the  living  body,  so  strong  on  opening  the  large  cavities  and  so 
striking  on  receiving  some  of  the  blood  of  the  vessels — arteries  as 
well  as  veins — into  the  hand,  were  all  due  to  the  same  condition 
of  this  fluid — the  actual  presence  of  ammoniacal  salts,  one  of  the 
surest  proofs  of  the  putrescent  condition  of  the  vital  fluid ;  in  fact, 
to  speak  paradoxically,  of  the  existence  of  death  during  life." 


THE  SIGNS  OF  DEATH  31 

Here  the  source  of  the  smell  is  indicated  as  coming 
from  the  development  of  ammonia  in  decomposing  blood. 
It  is  known  that  musk  contains  ammonia  largely,  together 
with  a  volatile  oil.  Robiquet  holds  that  its  odour  de- 
pends upon  the  decomposition  of  the  ammonia,  liberating 
the  volatile  matters  of  the  oil.  The  blood  also  contains 
a  volatile  oil,  and  it  is  well  known  that  it  possesses  odour. 
This  odour  may  be  developed  by  adding  sulphuric  acid  to 
blood  and  boiling  it.  This  process  was  formerly  resorted 
to  in  order  to  distinguish  blood  in  questionable  cases,  but 
it  has  been  rendered  obsolete  since  the  discovery  of  the 
blood  corpuscles  by  the  microscope.  Such  a  method 
would  be  well  suited  to  drive  off  the  ammonia,  free  from 
decomposition,  together  with  the  volatile  oil — to  which 
substance  the  odour  is  very  likely  due. 

Originally,  Dr.  Isham  was  inclined  to  limit  the  occur- 
rence of  the  manifestation  to  within  a  very  short  time  of 
death.  That  it  cannot  be  so  restricted  is  evidenced  by 
''Instance  1,"  when  it  was  noticed  thirty-three  hours 
before  death.  The  conditions  here  were  not  unfavourable 
for  its  development.  From  the  state  of  circulation, 
chemical  changes  were  evidently  proceeding  in  the  blood, 
elevating  its  temperature  and  liberating  those  matters 
to  which  we  would  ascribe  the  origin  of  the  death  smell. 

Richardson  and  Dinnis  have  shown  by  experiments 
that  ammonia  salts  added  to  blood  preserve  its  fluidity 
by  preventing  the  decomposition  of  fibrin.  This  is  not 
without  a  bearing  upon  the  origin  of  the  odor  mortis. 
In  gradual  death  coagulation  commences  first  in  the 
capillaries,  and  proceeds  towards  the  heart.  The  escape 
of  ammonia  from  the  blood  in  the  peripheral  vessels, 
liberating  the  volatile  principles  and  engendering  smell, 
permits  local  decomposition  of  fibrin  long  before  the 
heart  has  ceased  its  action. 

But  La.nge  has  more  recently  investigated  the  action 


32  DEATH 

of  ammonia  in  living  and  dead  blood.  He  found  that 
carbonate  of  ammonia  added  to  living  blood  was  only 
given  off  at  a  temperature  of  176°  F.  to  194°  F.  When, 
however,  ammonia  was  added  to  blood  from  a  dead 
animal,  it  was  evolved  at  a  temperature  of  from  104°  to 
113°  F.  It  is  well  ascertained  that  in  many  diseases, 
just  previous  to  death,  the  blood  temperature  is  raised 
above  the  lowest  figure  given  by  Lange.  In  some 
diseases,  too,  the  blood  falls  below  the  normal  bodily 
temperature.  This  affords  another  and  principal  explana- 
tion why  the  odor  mortis  may  not  be  appreciable.  These 
experiments  of  Lange  also  show  why  this  smell  is  not 
developed  by  diseases  characterised  by  great  elevation  of 
temperature — simply  because  the  blood  has  lost  none  of 
its  vital  properties. 

Such  is  the  attempt  of  science  to  account  for  this 
remarkable  fact.  When  we  come  to  consider  "  death 
coincidences  "  in  Part  III.,  wo  shall,  we  think,  find  that 
another  interpretation  of  the  facts  may  be  put  upon  such 
cases.     However,  we  will  not  anticipate. 

3.  Rigor  Mortis. 

Next  to  putrefaction,  rigor  mortis  may  be  considered 
the  surest  sign  of  death  that  we  know.  Unless  the 
burial  clothes  are  put  on  the  corpse  soon  after  death, 
it  is  almost  impossible  to  get  them  on  at  all,  owing  to  the 
stiffening  of  the  body.  Yet  it  is  contended  by  certain 
authorities  that  frequently  there  is  no  rigor  mortis  what- 
ever. Bichat  found  that  in  cases  in  which  an  individual 
had  been  struck  dead  by  lightning,  or  had  been  suffocated 
by  charcoal,  there  was  no  rigor  mortis.  When  complete, 
rigor  mortis  is  very  severe ;  the  body  becomes  as  stiff  as 
a  board,  and  it  is  next  to  impossible  to  bend  or  flex  the 
arms  and  legs. 


THE  SIGNS  OF  DEATH  33 

Generally,  it  may  be  said  that  rigor  mortis  appears 
in  from  three  to  six  hours  after  death.  Quite  frequently 
it  appears  before  the  bodily  heat  has  passed  away. 
Niederkorn  gives  us  the  following  table,  the  result  of 
103   cases  observed  by  him : — 

Rigor  mortis  within  2  hours  after  death,     2  cases 


From  2  to     4 

„       4  to     6 

6  to     8 

8  to  10 

„     10  to  13 


Total 


45 
24 
18 
11 
3 

103 


It  is  evident,  therefore,  that  the  length  of  time  that 
elapses  between  death  and  rigor  mortis  varies  con- 
siderably. It  is  asserted  that  "  after  poisoning  by  a 
large  dose  of  strychnine,  rigor  mortis  follows  imme- 
diately upon  the  phenomena  of  contracture  which 
existed  at  the  time  the  patient  died." 

"  With  regard  to  the  duration  of  rigidity,"  says  Dr.  Brouardel,^ 
"  \ye  are  also  obliged  to  make  allowance  for  different  influences.  It 
lasts  on  an  average  twenty-four  to  forty-eight  hours.  It  may,  how- 
ever, last  for  a  few  hours  only  ;  at  other  times,  it  persists  for 
five,  six,  or  seven  days.  Our  data  with  reference  to  this  subject 
are  very  scanty.  We  know  that  in  exhausted  individuals,  such  as 
those  dying  with  cancer  or  phthisis,  rigor  mortis  appears  early, 
l)ut  does  not  last  long;  on  the  contrary,  in  an  individual  dying 
while  in  good  health,  it  appears  late,  and  is  of  long  duration.  .  .  . 
Cadaveric  rigidity  appears  first  in  the  muscles  of  the  lower  jaw, 
then  in  those  of  the  neck  and  eyelids,  then  the  lower  limbs,  and 
lastly  the  upper  limbs.  .  .  .  The  muscles  of  the  intestinal  walls 
may  present  a  certain  degree  of  rigidity." 

The   heart    becomes    rigid    after    death    also ;    a    fact 


^  Death  and  Sudden  Death,  p.  GU. 


34  DEATH 

observed  by  the  illustrious  Harvey,  and  noted  by  him 
in  his  Second  Disquisition} 

When  persons  die  from  the  result  of  sun-stroke  or 
heat-stroke,  they  are  already  half  rigid,  and  it  is  stated 
that  the  heart  becomes  rigid  immediately  upon  the 
death  of  the  body.  Vallain  states  that  when  he  was 
in  Algeria,  he  opened  the  bodies  of  dogs  dying  from 
sun-stroke,  and,  Avhen  he  cut  into  the  heart,  it  yielded 
a  sound  like  that  of  wood !  Generally  speaking,  rigor 
mortis  appears  much  sooner  in  a  warm  and  moist  atmos- 
phere. Indeed,  it  has  been  asserted  that  it  takes  just  as 
many  hours  to  effect  the  same  result  in  the  summer  time 
as  it  does  days  in  the  winter.  When  the  body  is  fatigued, 
rigor  mortis  appears  much  more  rapidly. 

Dr.  Brown-Sequard,  writing  on  this  subject,  said : 

"  In  rabbits,  guinea-pigs,  cats,  and  birds,  as  well  as  in  dogs,  I 
have  ascertained  that  when  they  are  killed  by  poisons  causing  con- 
vulsions, the  more  violent  and  the  more  frequent  the  convulsions 
are,  the  sooner  cadaveric  rigidity  sets  in,  and  the  less  is  the  time 
it  lasts ;  the  sooner  also  does  putrefaction  appear,  and  the  quicker 
is  its  progress."  ^ 

What  is  rigor  mortis  ?  What  is  its  nature  ?  In  what 
does  it  consist  ?  This  has  been  a  very  vexed  question ; 
and  only  of  late  years  has  it  been  satisfactorily  settled. 
Kuhne  believed  that  it  was  due  to  the  coagulation  of 
myosin,  an  albuminous  substance  contained  in  the  mus- 
cular tissue.  Brown-Sequard  objected  to  this,  that  no 
amount  of  such  coagulation  would  account  for  the  facts. 
Microscopic  examination  of  muscles  has  frequently  re- 
vealed no  structural  difference  whatever  between  those 
in  a  state  of  rigidity,  and  those  that  were  flaccid.     Some 

*  Harvey's  treatise  on  the  circulation  of  the  blood  should  be  read  by 
every  one,  as  it  is  a  model  of  sound,  logical  argument. 
2  Quoted  by  Savory,  Life  and  Death,  pp.  190,  191. 


THE  SIGNS  OF  DEATH  35 

observers  ascertained  that  an  acid  reaction  was  found  in 
the  muscles  at  such  times ;  and  conchided  that  rigidity 
was  due  to  the  conversion  of  alkahne  substances  into 
acids ;  but  Achtakaweski  has  proved  that  in  tetanus 
the  muscles  are  not  rigid,  and  that  the  injection  of  an 
alkali  into  the  muscular  tissue  does  not  prevent  rigidity. 
It  has  even  been  ascertained  that  rigidity  will  take  place 
as  usual,  even  if  all  posthumous  circulation  be  cut  off! 
Brown-Sequard  removed  the  spinal  cord  from  an  animal, 
and  found  that  no  rigidity  resulted.  His  researches, 
however,  have  been  largely  disproved  by  recent  experi- 
menters. 

While  much  still  remains  uncertain,  it  is  now  generally 
admitted  that  rigor  mortis  is  the  first  stage  of  putrefac- 
tion—  of  which  we  shall  presently  treat — and  is  hence 
the  result  of  bacterial  decomposition.  Herzen  proved 
that  there  is  found  in  the  muscular  tissue  of  a  dead 
animal,  an  acid,  which  he  called  "  sarcolactic  acid."  By 
injecting  some  drops  of  this  acid  into  the  muscles  of 
dead  animals,  he  caused  rigor  mortis  to  appear  in  cases 
which  had  not  as  yet  exhibited  it.  Rigor  mortis  is 
doubtless  the  result  of  certain  micro-organisms,  which 
secrete  toxins  in  the  muscular  tissue,  causing  rigor  mortis 
in  this  manner.  The  subject  will  become  more  clear 
when  we  consider  the  phenomena  of  putrefaction.  To 
this  we  accordingly  turn. 

4.  Putrefaction. 

The  phenomena  of  putrefaction  are  of  great  interest  and 
importance,  since  they  frequently  enable  the  practitioner 
to  tell  almost  exactly  how  long  a  certain  body  has  been 
dead,  and  for  that  reason  are  of  great  value  to  forensic  medi- 
cine. The  subject  may  appear  an  unpleasant  one  to  many 
readers ;  but,  rightly  considered,  it  is  not  so,  and  aftbrds  a 


36  DEATH 

field  for  very  interesting  experiments  and  important  de- 
ductions. Bear  in  mind  the  fact,  that  putrefaction  is  merely 
the  process  of  returning  the  body  to  the  native,  mineral 
elements,  and  there  should  be  no  objection  to  studying 
this  process  from  the  scientific  point  of  view.  Remove 
from  the  mind  the  idea  of  a  ''  corpse,"  and  replace  it  by 
the  following:  here  is  an  organic  compound;  let  us 
watch  its  gradual  disintegration  and  return  to  mother 
earth ! 

It  has  been  proved  that  if  a  body  be  perfectly  pre- 
served from  the  air,  it  will  not,  cccteris  paribus,  decay  or 
putrefy  at  all.  Pasteur  experimented  with  blood  and 
urine,  the  most  fermentable  and  putrescible  of  all  organic 
fluids.  These  fluids  he  sealed  up  hermetically  in  glass 
tubes.  Although  these  tubes  are  in  his  laboratory  yet, 
having  been  placed  there  in  1854,  there  is  to-day  not 
the  slightest  trace  of  putrefaction  in  any  of  them.  The 
presence  of  air  is  therefore  necessary,  in  order  that 
putrefaction  may  proceed.     Why  is  this  ? 

When  a  body  dies,  three  different  and  distinct  sets  of 
micro-organisms  occupy  it,  one  after  the  other.  First, 
there  are  the  "  aerobic "  organisms,  so  called  because 
they  cannot  live  without  the  presence  of  oxygen,  which 
they  obtain  from  the  air.  Following  them,  there  is  the 
second  set,  able  to  live  either  with  or  without  oxygen ; 
and  these  M.  Bordas,  in  his  thesis  on  "  Putrefaction," 
has  called  "  amphibious."  These  produce  carbonic  acid, 
also  hydrogen  and  hydro-carbons.  Lastly,  there  comes 
another  category  of  micro-organisms,  the  "  anaerobic  " 
class,  which  do  not  live  in  oxygen,  and  which  produce 
hydrogen,  nitrogen,  and  more  or  less  compound  ammonias. 
These  organisms  follow  one  another,  for  the  reason  that 
each  class  secretes  a  poison  in  the  presence  of  which  it 
is  unable  to  live.  It  then  disappears,  and  is  replaced  by 
other  colonies,  and  so  on,  until  the  destruction  of  the 


THE  SIGNS  OF  DEATH  37 

body  is  complete.  This  explains  why  it  is  that  air  is 
necessary  to  render  putrefaction  possible  ;  the  first  set  of 
micro-organisms  can  only  exist  and  set  up  their  char- 
acteristic effects  when  there  is  a  certain  amount  of  free 
oxygen,  and  this  they  have  to  obtain  from  the  atmos- 
phere. If  this  be  shut  off,  putrefaction  can  be  prevented 
for  a  very  long  time.  It  illustrates,  also,  the  beautiful  pro- 
vision of  nature ;  the  method  employed  to  disintegrate 
the  body  and  return  it  to  its  elements  as  speedily  as 
possible. 

Putrefaction  takes  place  at  a  different  rate  and  in  a 
different  manner,  according  to  the  medium  in  which  the 
body  is  placed.  We  have  already  seen  the  effects  of 
withdrawing  the  body  from  a  medium  altogether,  placing 
it  in  vacuo.  If  the  body  be  in  the  air,  it  will  decompose 
in  one  way,  if  in  water  in  another ;  it  will  putrefy  in  a 
different  manner  still  in  the  earth — and  even  here  there 
is  a  great  difference,  according  to  the  nature  of  the  soil 
in  which  the  body  is  placed. 

"  Micro-organisms  can,  of  course,  enter  the  body  through  the 
epidermis,  but  they  seem  to  be  very  slow  in  doing  so  in  the 
majority  of  cases.  Usually  putrefaction  begins  in  the  digestive 
tract.  It  is  especially  a  function  of  the  processes  which  take  place 
in  the  intestines.  M.  Duclaux,  who  has  paid  much  attention  to 
the  '  vibrios '  of  the  intestines,  has  succeeded  in  determining  the 
part  they  play  in  putrefaction.  At  death  they  swarm  ;  they 
penetrate  into  the  intestinal  glands,  which  they  destroy,  find  their 
way  into  the  veins  and  peritoneum,  and  produce  gases  there,  and 
secrete  diastase,  which  liquefies  the  tissues.  What  is  the  conse- 
quence of  this  formation  of  gas  and  diastase  %  The  quantity  of 
gas  produced  is  considerable,  its  tension  is  sometimes  equal  to 
that  of  li  atmospheres  ;  it  also  pushes  up  the  diaphragm  to  the 
third  intercostal  space,  and  drives  the  liquid  contained  in  the  deep 
vessels  towards  the  periphery  ;  that  is  what  I  have  called  the 
posthumous  circulation." 


38  DEATH 

The  significance  of  this  fact  will  be  apparent  when  we 
come  to  a  discussion  on  "  Vampires."    (See  Appendix  A.) 

If  a  person  dies  from  suftbcation  from  carbonic  acid 
gas,  his  tissues  contain  very  little  oxygen,  and,  in  conse- 
quence, the  first  set  of  micro-organisms  have  great 
difficulty  in  gaining  a  foothold  within  the  body. 
Brouardel  gives  a  case  in  which  a  corpse  was  found 
to  be  in  a  perfect  state  of  preservation  two  months  after 
death — the  man  having  committed  suicide  in  this 
manner. 

Of  course,  other  causes  influence  putrefaction  greatly. 
The  state  of  health  at  the  time  of  dying  is  known  to  be 
one  great  contributory  cause.  Patients  dying  of  cancer 
putrefy  very  slowly  for  some  reason.  If  there  be  food  in 
the  stomach,  decomposition  takes  place  more  rapidly 
than  if  there  be  none,  which  is  what  we  should  expect 
a  priori.  If  the  coffin  is  badly  closed,  decomposition 
will  be  more  rapid  than  if  it  is  well  sealed  :  the  degree 
of  moisture  of  the  soil,  or  the  reverse :  whether  the  body 
be  placed  in  a  wooden  or  a  leaden  coffin — all  these 
factors  help  to  determine  the  rate  and  character  of  the 
subsequent  putrefaction. 

When  bodies  are  retained  in  the  air  for  some  days, 
^nd  putrefaction  sets  in,  the  body  swells  up  from  the 
created  gas,  and  this  has  to  be  removed,  in  order  to 
prevent  tainting  of  the  atmosphere.  What,  then,  is 
done  ?  This :  holes  are  pricked  in  the  bodies,  and  a 
lighted  match  applied  to  these  minute  orifices.  Long, 
bluish  flames  start  forth,  like  those  of  a  blow-pipe. 
These  remain  ignited  sometimes  for  three  or  four  days, 
then  the  combustibility  of  the  gas  ceases.  When 
decomposition  is  more  advanced  the  gas  will  not  take 
fire  in  this  manner.  This  is  due  to  the  fact  that  the 
gases  created  during  the  later  stages  of  decomposition 
are  not  combustible ;  those  in  the  earlier  stages  are. 


THE  SIGNS  OF  DEATH  39 

During  decomposition  phosphoretted  hydrogen  is  fre- 
quently formed.  "  Before  the  time  when  refrigerating 
apparatus  was  employed  at  the  Morgue — that  is  to 
say,  prior  to  1882 — phosphorescence  was  often  noticed 
there,  especially  in  w^arm  weather,  Wills-o'-the-wisp, 
which  ran  over  and  around  the  bodies.  It  was  a 
very  impressive  spectacle."  This  has  great  significance, 
when  we  remember  the  frequent  allusions  to  "  corpse 
lights,"  &c. — spirits  that  were  supposed  to  hover  above 
the  grave  in  the  graveyard,  and  which  have  doubtless 
given  rise  to  many  a  ghost  story. 

When  a  body  decomposes  under  the  ground  little 
blebs  form  all  over  the  surface  of  the  body ;  these  are 
filled  with  a  sort  of  serum  and  blood.  The  epidermis 
then  separates  in  flakes.  Gases  are  formed  in  large 
quantities,  and  when  the  tissues  have  been  more  or  less 
liquefied  by  the  action  of  micro-organisms,  the  flesh  is 
ruptured,  thus  giving  vent  to  these  gases.  It  is  curious 
to  note  that  when  a  body  is  completely  covered  with 
animal  excreta,  it  decomposes  very  slowly  indeed ; 
whereas  precisely  the  reverse  of  this  is  what  we  should 
expect !  We  shall  not  do  more  than  refer  to  this  here, 
leaving  the  more  technical  discussion  for  more  strictly 
medical  treatises. 

When  a  body  decomposes  in  water,  many  interesting 
changes  take  place.  Dr.  Brouardel  assures  us  that  "  the 
first  green  patch  which  appears  does  not  show  itself  in 
the  region  of  the  ca3cum,  as  it  does  when  the  body 
putrefies  in  the  open  air,  but  over  the  sternum ; "  and  he 
adds,  "  I  cannot  explain  to  you  the  cause  of  this  varia- 
tion." Hofman  calculated  that  putrefaction  is  twice  as 
rapid  in  air  as  in  water.  The  Avater  in  which  the  body 
is  floating  penetrates  the  periphery,  and  enters  into  the 
blood  stream,  thus  preventing  coagulation  to  anything 
like  the  extent  that  would  take  place  in  the  air.      But 


40  DEATH 

when  the  body  is  withdrawn  from  the  water,  putrefaction 
takes  place  with  extreme  rapidity. 

The  best  account  of  what  takes  place  in  bodies  thrown 
into  water  is  the  following,  which  we  take  from  Death 
and  Sudden  Death,  p.  83  : — 

"  Bodies  more  frequently  undergo  transformation  into  fatty 
matter  in  the  water  than  in  the  open  air ;  this  transformation  is 
sometimes  complete  by  the  end  of  five  or  six  months.  If  it  had 
remained  exposed  in  the  open  air,  the  corpse  might  have  putrefied 
before  so  long  a  time  had  elapsed ;  if  it  had  been  placed  in  the 
earth,  it  would  be  necessary  to  take  into  consideration  the  state  of 
the  coffin  and  of  the  soil — putrefaction  might  be  hastened  or 
retarded  thereby.  In  the  water  the  phenomena  of  putrefaction 
follow  the  same  evolutionary  course  as  those  of  fermentation 
within  the  intestines.  The  Fenayrou  case  affords  a  demonstration 
of  this.  A  druggist  named  Aubert  was  murdered  in  the  country 
by  a  husband  and  wife  of  the  name  of  Fenayrou,  assisted  by  their 
brother.  To  get  rid  of  the  corpse  they  threw  it  into  the  Seine, 
after  having  enclosed  it  in  a  piece  of  lead  pipe.  They  hoped  that  thus 
it  would  stay  at  the  bottom  of  the  water.  Three  days  afterwards 
Aubert  floated,  though  still  enclosed  in  the  lead  pipe.  An  enor- 
mous quantity  of  lead  would  be  necessary  to  jorevent  a  body  from 
rising  to  the  surface ;  the  only  means  of  keeping  the  body  at  the 
bottom  would  be  to  open  the  abdomen  and  perforate  the  intes- 
tines ;  in  this  way  the  gases  would  escape  as  soon  as  they  were 
produced." 

Sajjonijication. — This  occurs  only  in  bodies  lying  in 
water,  or  in  very  damp  ground.  As  a  general  rule,  this 
adipocere  forms  the  more  readily  the  fatter  the  bodies 
are.  In  recently  dead  bodies  it  is  a  white  matter,  soft, 
brittle,  and  somewhat  watery.  When  exposed  to  the  air 
it  dries  up. 

Saponification  is  the  scientific  term.  It  consists 
of  the  fatty  matter  combined  at  first  with  the  ammonia 


THE  SIGNS  OF  DEATH  41 

disengaged  by  decomposition.  It  thus  forms  an  am- 
moniacal  soap.  If  it  is  in  water,  the  lime  of  the 
water  drives  off  the  ammonia,  and  thus  forms  a  lime 
soap,  and  may  remain  unchanged  for  a  long  period. 
Some  think  that  the  body  may  be  completely  saponified 
in  a  year.  Bodies  of  infants  may  saponify  in  six  weeks 
to  thirteen  months.  It  is  probable  that  it  begins  in 
three  or  four  months  in  water.  In  one  case  where  the 
body  was  half  out  of  the  water,  after  fourteen  months 
the  lower  part  was  saponified  and  the  rest  not.  This 
soapy  matter  becomes  ultimately  broken  up  and  washed 
away,  if  in  water. 

The  different  organs  of  the  body  decompose  at  very 
different  rates,  and  in  different  manners.  The  bones,  of 
course,  last  longest  of  all,  becoming  more  and  more  light 
as  time  goes  on,  and  they  gradually  lose  their  animal 
matter.  It  is  asserted  that  the  uterus  is  the  last  orsfan 
to  decompose.  In  adults  the  brain  decomposes  slowly, 
in  children  more  quickly.  The  liver  becomes  light  after 
death,  and  will  float  when  thrown  into  water.  This  is 
due  to  the  formation  of  gas  within  its  structure.  The 
lungs  of  an  adult  (and  those  of  a  child)  decompose  in  a 
different  manner  from  those  of  a  babe  who  has  never 
breathed.  The  eye  decomposes  and  vanishes  at  the  end 
of  about  two  months ;  the  nails  become  loose  about  the 
twentieth  day. 

Bodies  decompose  at  different  rates.  Some  of  them 
disintegrate  and  liquefy  very  speedily;  others  take  months 
and  even  years  to  reach  the  same  advanced  stage  of 
putrefaction.  The  causes  of  these  differences  are  not 
known,  but  it  would  not  be  a  difficult  matter  to  con- 
jecture, at  least,  in  the  majority  of  instances.  That 
remarkable  cases  of  the  kind  exist,  there  can  be  no  doubt. 
Brouardel  mentions  one  in  which  a  leaden  coffin  was 
opened   at   the   end   of  three    months,   and    the    corpse 


42  DEATH 

"  looked  as  if  it  were  in  a  bath  of  sweat ;  it  was  covered 
Avith  moisture,  and  the  skin  was  corrugated."  In  another 
case,  "  a  woman  poisoned  by  Pel  was  found,  four  years 
after  death,  in  the  exact  condition  in  which  she  was 
when  put  into  her  coffin."  In  yet  another  remarkable 
case,  a  number  of  soldiers  were  buried  together.  Five 
years  later  they  were  disinterred,  when  we  find  that 
"  some  of  them  were  skeletons,  clothed  with  remains 
of  their  belts,  &c.,  others  were  still  in  such  a  state  of 
preservation  that  their  features  could  be  recognised." 
"  The  fact,"  he  adds,  "  cannot  be  explained  at  present. 
All  sorts  of  hypqtheses  are  possible.  We  may  assume 
that  all  these  men  had  not  the  same  species  of  micro- 
organism in  their  digestive  tubes"  (p.  98). 

As  the  net  result  of  our  inquiry,  therefore,  we  find 
that  every  test  of  death  is  unreliable,  with  the  single 
exception  of  putrefaction.  Even  here,  certain  discolora- 
tions  and  spots  may  appear  on  the  surface  of  the  body 
on  occasion,  which  may  be  mistaken  for  decomposition  ; 
and  it  would  be  well  to  wait  until  unmistakable  signs 
develop.  But,  on  the  whole,  decomposition  may  be  con- 
sidered a  fairly  reliable  test.  It  is,  at  all  events,  the  only 
fairly  reliable  sign,  and  certainly  the  only  sign  that 
the  layman  can  trust  and  avail  himself  of.  Sir  Benjamin 
Ward  Richardson,  writing  on  this  subject,  stated  that 
only  in  a  comhination  of  signs,  all  appearing  together, 
is  safety  to  be  found.  He  enumerates  the  following 
indications  : — Respiratory  failure,  cardiac  failure,  absence 
of  turgescence  or  filling  of  the  veins  on  making  pressure 
between  them  and  the  heart,  reduction  of  the  tempera- 
ture of  the  body,  rigor  mortis,  coagulation  of  the  blood, 
putrefactive  decomposition,  absence  of  red  colour  in 
semi-transparent  parts  under  the  infiuence  of  a  powerful 
stream  of  light,  absence  of  muscular  contraction  under  the 


THE  SIGNS  OF  DEATH  43 

stimulus  of  galvanism,  heat,  or  of  puncture,  absence  of 
red  blush  on  the  skin  after  subcutaneous  injection  of 
ammonia,  absence  of  signs  of  rust  or  oxidation  of  a  bright 
steel  blade  after  plunging  it  deep  into  the  tissues.  Sir 
Benjamin  sums  up  the  matter  thus  : — 

"  If  all  these  signs  point  to  death  .  .  .  the  evidence  may  be 
considered  conclusive  that  death  is  absolute.  If  these  leave  any 
sign  for  doubt,  or  even  if  they  leave  no  doubt,  one  further  point  of 
practice  should  be  carried  out.  The  body  should  be  kept  in  a 
room,  the  temperature  of  which  has  been  raised  to  a  heat  of  84°  F., 
with  moisture  diffused  through  the  air,  and  in  this  warm  and  moist 
atmosphere  it  should  remain  until  distinct  indications  of  putre- 
factive decomposition  have  set  in." 


CHAPTER   III 

TRANCE,  CATALEPSY,  SUSPENDED  ANIMATION,  &c. 

Dr.  George  Moore,  in  his  Use  of  the  Body  in  Relation  to 
the  Mind,  p.  31,  says: — "  A  state  of  the  body  is  certainly 
sometimes  produced  (in  man)  which  is  nearly  analogous 
to  the  torpor  of  the  lower  animals — a  condition  utterly 
inexplicahle  hy  any  jjrinciple  taught  in  the  schools!'  This 
was  written  some  years  ago,  but  it  still  holds  good. 
Very  little,  indeed,  is  known  about  this  subject — more 
than  some  of  its  mere  phenomena — which  were  recog- 
nised and  carefully  studied  by  Braid,  who  wrote  his 
memoir,  Observations  on  Trance  ;  or,  Human  Hiheiiiaiion, 
in  1850.  When  we  come  to  inquire  into  the  cause, 
the  real  essence  of  trance  and  kindred  states,  we  find 
an  amazing  lack  of  knowledge  on  these  subjects — mostly 
due  to  the  fact,  no  doubt,  that  it  has  always  been  con- 
sidered a  mark  of  ''  superstition "  to  investigate  such 
cases ;  and  so,  until  the  last  few  years,  these  peculiar 
conditions  have  been  left  strictly  alone  by  the  medical 
profession.  When  a  condition  of  catalepsy  could  be 
shown  to  be  due  to  a  disordered,  nervous  condition, 
then  it  was  legitimate  to  study  such  a  case ;  but  when 
the  causes  of  the  trance  were  psychological  or  unknown, 
then  it  immediately  became  "  superstition  "  !  Even  to- 
day this  state  of  affairs  is  not  outgrown.  We  doubt  if 
more  than  one  physician  in  a  hundred  would  be  willing 
to  recognise  the  "  medium  trance,  "  e.y.,  as  a  separate 
state    requiring     prolonged    psychological    investigation. 

44 


TRANCE,  CATALEPSY,  &c.  45 

In  spite  of  the  fact  that  Professor  William  James 
pointed  out  the  absurdity  of  this  attitude,  it  is  still 
the  one  all  but  universally  maintained. 

AVriting  on  trance,  ecstasy,  catalepsy,  and  kindred 
states  in  Pepper's  System  of  Mediciiie,  vol.  v.  pp.  314-52, 
Dr.  Charles  K.  Mills  thus  defines  these  conditions  : — 

"  Catalepsy  is  a  functional  nervous  disease  characterised  by 
conditions  of  perverted  consciousness,  diminished  sensibility,  and 
especially  by  muscular  rigidity  or  immobility,  which  is  independent 
of  the  will,  and  in  consequence  of  which  the  whole  body,  the  limbs, 
or  the  parts  affected  remain  in  any  position  or  attitude  in  which 
they  may  be  placed." 

The  following  is  the  author's  definition  of  ecstasy : — 

"  Ecdasy  is  a  derangement  of  the  nervous  system,  characterised 
by  an  exalted  visionary  state,  absence  of  volition,  insensibility  to 
surroundings,  a  radiant  expression,  and  immobility  in  statuesque 
positions.  Commonly,  ecstasy  and  catalepsy,  or  ecstasy  and 
hysterico-epilepsy,  or  all  three  of  these  disorders,  alternate,  co- 
exist, or  occur  at  intervals  in  the  same  individual.  Occasionally, 
however,  the  ecstatic  seizure  is  the  only  one  that  attracts  attention. 
Usually,  in  ecstasy,  the  concentration  of  mind  and  the  visionary 
appearance  have  reference  to  religious  or  spiritual  subjects. 

"  Trance  may  be  defined  as  a  derangement  of  the  nervous  system, 
characterised  by  general  muscular  immobility,  complete  mental 
inertia,  and  insensibility  to  surroundings.  The  condition  of  a 
patient  in  a  state  of  trance  has  been  frequently  and  not  inaptly 
compared  to  that  of  a  hibernating  animal.  Trance  may  last  for 
minutes,  hours,  days,  weeks,  or  even  months.  In  trance,  as  in 
ecstasy,  the  patient  may  remain  motionless  and  ai)parently  un- 
conscious of  all  surroundings ;  but  in  the  former  or  visionary 
state,  the  radiant  expression  and  the  statuesque  positions  are  not 
necessarily  present.  In  trance,  as  stated  by  Wilks,  the  patients 
may  lie  like  an  animal  hibernating  for  days  together,  without 
eating  or  drinking,  and  apparently  insensible  to  all  objects  around 
them.     In  ecstasy,  the  mind,  under  certain  limitations,  is  active  ; 


46  DEATH 

it  is  concentrated  upon  some  object  of  interest,  admiration,  or 
adoration.  Conditions  of  trance,  as  a  rule,  last  longer  than  those 
of  ecstasy." 

Baird's  theory  of  trance  is  that  it  is : — 

"A  functional  disease  of  the  nervous  system  in  which  the 
cerebral  activity  is  concentrated  in  some  limited  region  of  the 
brain,  with  suspension  of  the  activity  of  the  rest  of  the  brain, 
and  consequent  loss  of  volition.  Like  other  functional  nervous 
diseases,  it  may  be  induced  either  physically  or  psychically — 
that  is,  by  the  influences  that  act  on  the  nervous  system  or  on 
the  mind  ;  more  frequently  the  latter,  sometimes  both  combined." 

Dana '  reported  about  fifty  cases  of  prolonged  morbid 
somnolence.  He  did  not  include  among  them  cases  of 
drowsiness  due  to  old  age,  diseased  blood-vessels,  cerebral 
mal-nutrition,  or  inflammation,  various  toxsemiae  as 
malaria,  uraemia,  syphilis,  &c.,  dyspepsia,  diabetes, 
obesity,  insolation,  cerebral  anaemia,  and  hyperaemia, 
cerebral  tumours  and  cranial  injuries,  exhausting  dis- 
eases, and  the  sleeping-sickness  of  Africa. 

He  found  that  the  prolonged  somnolence  shows  itself 
in  very  different  ways.  Sometimes  the  patient  sufiters 
from  simply  a  great  prolongation  of  natural  sleep ; 
sometimes  from  a  constant,  persistent  drowsiness,  which 
he  is  often  obliged  to  yield  to  ;  sometimes  from  frequent 
brief  attacks  of  somnolence,  not  being  drowsy  in  the 
intermission  ;  sometimes  from  single  or  repeated  prolonged 
lethargic  attacks ;  finally,  sometimes  from  periodical 
attacks  of  profound  somnolence  or  lethargy  which  last 
for  days,  weeks,  or  months.  He  says  that  most  cases 
of  functional  morbid  somnolence  are  closely  related 
to  the  epileptic  or  hysterical  diathesis ;  but  a  class 
of  cases   is  met  with  in  which  no  history  or  evidence 

^  "Morbid  Drowsiness  and  Somnolence." — Journal  of  Nervous  and 
Mental  Diseases,  vol.  xi.,  April  18,  18S4. 


TRANCE,  CATALEPSY,  &c.  47 

of  epilepsy  or  hysteria  can  be  adduced,  and,  though 
they  may  be  called  epileptoid  or  hysteroid,  these 
designations  are  simply  makeshifts ;  the  patients  seem 
to  be  the  victims  of  a  special  morbid  hypnosis. 

Very  much  the  same  ground  is  taken  by  Dr.  William 
B.  Hammond  in  his  Spiritualism  and  Allied  Causes  and 
Conditions  of  Nervous  Derangement,  and  by  Dr.  Marvin  in 
his  Philosophy  of  Spiritualism.  It  will  be  seen  at  once, 
the  attitude  assumed  towards  trance,  ecstasy,  and  all 
kindred  states  is  the  attitude  of  pure  materialism. 
Doubtless  this  attitude  would  be  perfectly  justifiable  were 
it  capable  of  covering  and  explaining  all  the  facts ;  but  it 
can  fairly  be  said  that  such  an  interpretation  of  the  states 
noted  is  quite  incapable  of  explaining  them  all.  The 
medium-trance  is  totally  different  from  any  of  the  states 
that  have  been  discussed ;  it  shows  no  identity  with 
any  of  them.  It  is  not  dependent  upon  any  morbid 
state  of  body,  and  cannot  be  regarded  as  a  morbid 
symptom.  Indeed,  when  a  medium  is  ill,  trance  is  gener- 
ally impossible !  Further,  the  supporters  of  such  a  view 
would  have  to  account  for  the  supernormal  knowledge 
displayed  by  the  medium  while  in  the  trance  state. 
That  is  the  crmx.  We  do  not  care  what  theory  of  the 
nature  of  the  trance  state  may  be  held,  provided  that  it  is 
capable  of  explaining  all  the  facts.  The  current  material- 
istic theories  certainly  cannot  do  this. 

So  little  is  known  of  this  state  we  call  trance,  indeed, 
that  it  has  been  found  difficult  even  to  define.  Dr.  J. 
Brindley  James  says  of  this  condition  : — 

"  What,  then,  is  trance  ?  It  is  a  sleep-like  condition  that  comes 
on  spontaneously,  quite  apart  from  any  gross  lesion  of  the  brain 
or  from  any  toxic  agency,  and  from  which  the  sleeper  cannot  be 
roused  even  by  the  most  energetic  measures."  ^ 

^   Trance  :  its  Various  Aspects  and  Possible  Results,  pp.  3,  4. 


48  DEATH 

It  will  be  obvious  that  this  does  little  more  than  define 
the  state,  which  is  as  much  as  any  work  on  the  subject 
has  so  far  attempted.  Dr.  James  points  out  that,  owing 
to  our  ii^norance  of  the  nature  of  trance  and  of  its  limi- 
tations,  it  is  quite  possible  to  mistake  it  for  death  on 
occasion  unless  the  most  exacting  tests  be  employed. 
Various  persons  are  apt  to  fall  into  this  trance-like 
condition — "  mostly  educated  persons  of  nervous  tempe- 
rament." ^  This  trance-like  condition  is  said  to  result 
most  commonly  from  the  following  diseases  or  their 
complications : — 

"  Catalepsy,  hysteria,  chorea,  hypnotism,  somnambulism,  neuras- 
thenia, stroke  by  lightning,  sun-stroke,  anaesthesia  from  chloroform, 
&c. ;  eclampsic  coma  in  pregnancy,  still-birth ;  cold,  asphyxia 
from  various  gases,  vapours,  and  smoke ;  narcotism  from  opium 
and  other  agents ;  convulsive  maladies,  drowning,  nervous  shock 
from  gunshot,  electricity,  and  other  injuries;  smothering  under 
snow,  earth,  grain,  or  in  bed ;  strangulation,  epilepsy,  mental  and 
physical  exhaustion,  syncope,  extreme  heat  and  cold,  alcoholic  in- 
toxication, haemorrhages,  suspended  animation  from  mental  dis- 
orders, excessive  emotion,  fright,  intense  excitement,  &c. ;  apoplectic 
seizures,  so-called  '  heart-faihires,'  and  many  other  diseases."  ^ 

The  condition  known  to  us  as  trance  is  both  uncertain 
and  fluctuating.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  hypnotic 
trance,  or  trance  induced  by  the  mesmeric  process  (if  there 
be  any  difference  between  them),  is  remarkably  deep — so 
deep  indeed,  that  Dr.  Esdaile  was  enabled  to  perform, 
under  its  influence,  some  261  operations  of  a  painful  and 
critical  character,  which  he  enumerates  in  his  Clairvoyance, 
pp.  168-9.  Such  operations  as  the  removal  of  a  cancer 
of  the   eyeball ;  amputation  of  a  thigh,  a  leg,  an   arm : 

^   Hov)  the  State  can  Prevent  Premature  Burial.    By  James  R.  Williamson. 
2  Plan  for  Formimj  Associations  for  the  Prevention  of  Premature  Burial, 
&c.,  pp.  5,6. 


TRANCE,  CATALEPSY,  &c.  49 

various  operations  for  the  removal  of  tumours — opera- 
tions that  certainly  cannot  be  performed  easily  or  upon  a 
patient  who  is  not  under  the  influence  of  an  anaesthetic, 
mental  or  physical.  It  is  amusing,  in  the  light  of  our 
present  knowledge,  to  see  the  attempts  of  many  medical 
men  of  that  day  to  account  for  Esdaile's  cases.  They 
went  so  far  as  to  assert  that  the  patients  operated  upon 
were  merely  hardened  rogues  paid  to  withstand  the  pain  ! 
The  phenomenon  of  trance,  both  natural  and  induced, 
is  noAv  acknowledged,  however,  and  recognised  by  all 
psychologists. 

When  we  come  to  consider  the  nature  and  causes  of 
trance,  we  find  the  greatest  difficulty  in  forming  any  con- 
ception of  it.  All  purely  physiological  explanations  must 
certainly  be  abandoned.  They  do  not  account  for  the 
hypnotic  phenomena,  far  less  for  trances  of  spontaneous 
or  mediumistic  type.  Trance  differs  essentially  also  from 
sleep,  though  of  course  the  two  have  something  in  common. 
A  nearer  analogy,  probably,  is  the  hypnotic  trance ; 
and  it  has  occurred  to  us  that  the  mediumistic  trance 
might  be  a  type  of  hypnotic  influence  from  "  the  other 
side,"  just  as  the  hypnotic  trance  that  we  know  is  a  species 
of  mental  influence  from  this  side.  In  other  words,  both 
hypnotic  and  mediumistic  trances  may  be  samples  of 
mental  influence — the  one  from  the  mind  of  a  living, 
the  other  from  that  of  a  dead  operator.  This  would 
seem  to  be  strengthened  by  the  fact  that  mediums  are 
frequently  very  insusceptible  to  hypnotic  or  even  to 
normal  suggestion  from  operators  on  this  side.  Mrs. 
Piper  has  been  tested  for  this,  for  example,  and  no  trace 
of  any  faculty  of  thought  transference  has  been  found, 
and  only  a  light  state  of  hypnosis  could  be  induced  in 
her,  even  after  prolonged  attempts.  This  would  seem  to 
indicate  that  the  more  an  individual  spirit  is  en  rapport 
with  another  world,  the  less  is   it  c?i  rapport  with  this. 

D 


50  DEATH 

Mr.  Myers,  in  his  Human  Personality,  has  distinguished 
three  distinct  types  of  trance.     He  says : — 

"  The  first  step,  apparently,  is  the  abeyance  of  the  supra-hminal 
self,  and  the  dominance  of  the  sub-liminal  self,  which  may  lead  in 
some  cases  to  a  form  of  trance  (or  what  we  have  hitherto  called 
secondary  personality),  where  the  whole  body  of  the  automatist  is 
controlled  by  his  own  sub-liminal  self,  or  incarnate  spirit,  but  where 
there  is  no  indication  of  discarnate  spirits.  The  next  form  of 
trance  is  where  the  incarnate  spirit,  whether  or  not  maintaining 
control  of  the  whole  body,  makes  excursions  into,  or  holds  tele- 
pathic intercourse  with,  the  spiritual  world.  And,  lastly,  there  is 
the  trance  of  possession  by  another,  a  discarnate  spirit.  We  cannot, 
of  course,  always  distinguish  between  these  three  main  types  of 
trance,  which,  as  we  shall  see  later,  themselves  admit  of  different 
degrees  and  varieties," 

Mr.  Myers  contends  elsewhere  that  the  simplest  aspect 
of  trance  is  "  suggested  sleep,"  which  Avould  seem  to  agree 
somewhat  with  the  theory  advanced  above.  Dreams,  the 
author  shows,  by  analogy,  to  be  "  bubbles  breaking  upon 
the  surface  from  the  deep  below."  Extending  his  analogy, 
he  has  conceived  clairvoyance  as  a  state  in  which  the 
spirit  of  the  seer  is  enabled  to  leave  the  body  and  travel 
through  different  scenes  and  localities.  In  ecstasy,  the 
soul  would  change  its  environment  and  pass  for  a  time 
into  the  spiritual  world,  retaining  such  relations  to  the 
organism  as  enables  it  to  return  to  its  ordinary  condition. 
And  so,  our  author  goes  on,  "  when  the  last  change  comes, 
and  we  ask  ourselves  with  what  added  ground  for  specu- 
lation we  now  strain  our  gaze  beyond  that  obscurest 
crisis,"  we  find — that  death  is  an  irrevocable  self-projec- 
tion of  the  spirit :  that  condition  in  which  the  spirit  has 
emerged  from  the  body,  and,  because  of  altered  physical 
conditions,  is  unable  to  return  to  it. 


TRANCE,  CATALEPSY,  &c.  51 

Sleep  and  Death. 

Many  analogies  have  been  drawn  between  sleep  and 
death,  and  death  is  often  called  "  the  last  sleep."  But 
there  is  always  this  distinction  between  the  two,  that 
in  the  one  case  we  revive  and  return  to  animate  the 
body,  and  in  the  other  case  we  do  not.  Where 
consciousness  is,  what  becomes  of  it  during  the  hours 
of  sleep,  has  always  been  one  of  the  most  bitterly 
disputed  points  in  psychology.  Certain  it  is  that  self- 
consciousness  is  absent  ^;?'o  tcm. ;  but  whether  it  is  anni- 
hilated, as  materialism  teaches,  or  merely  withdrawn,  as 
the  opposite  school  avers,  is  a  question  that  is  as  far  as 
ever  from  being  satisfactorily  answered.  Many  are  the 
battles  that  have  been  fought  over  this  point,  but  none 
of  them  have  ever  been  won !  Truly  the  field  is  open, 
and  the  world  is  at  the  feet  of  the  man  who  shall  discover 
the  innermost  nature  of  sleep.  It  is  equally  a  mystery 
with  death,  and  it  is  probable  that  there  is  some  close 
interdependence  between  them.  Veridical  and  super- 
normal dreams ;  cross-correspondence  between  dreams 
and  the  statements  made  by  trance  mediums ;  above  all, 
such  remarks  as  "  your  sleep  is  our  life,"  would  seem  to 
indicate  that  the  human  spirit  is  simply  withdrawn  during 
the  hours  of  sleep — being  revivified  in  some  other  sphere. 
However,  these  are  questions  into  which  we  cannot 
enter  now. 

Both  trance  and  catalepsy  occur  spontaneously  :  both 
may  also  be  induced  artificially  by  hypnotism.  Both 
are  mistaken  for  death,  and  in  many  respects  they  are 
very  similar.  In  catalepsy  the  body  is  rigid,  whereas  in 
trance  this  is  very  rarely  the  case — this  forming  the  chief 
mark  of  distinction  (external  indication)  between  the  two 
states.  What  the  internal  differences  are  we  do  not  know. 
Various  attempts,  however,  have  been  made  to  define  them. 


52  DEATH 

Dr.  Franz  Hartmann,  e.g.,  thus  distinguishes  them : — 
There  seems  hardly  any  hniit  to  the  time  during  which 
a  person  may  remain  in  a  trance ;  but  catalepsy  is  due 
to  some  obstruction  in  the  organic  mechanism  of  the 
body  on  account  of  its  exhausted  nervous  power.  In 
the  last  case  the  activity  of  life  begins  again  as  soon  as 
the  impediment  is  removed  or  the  nervous  energy  has 
recuperated  its  strength. 

Whatever  the  innermost  nature  of  this  trance  state 
may  be,  it  seems  certain  that  some  individuals  have  the 
faculty  of  inducing  this  condition  at  will,  just  as  it  may 
bo  induced  by  hypnotic  processes  from  without.  The 
Fakirs  of  India  doubtless  possess  this  power  to  some 
extent.  Braid  gave  what  was  probably  the  first  authentic 
account  of  their  remarkable  cases  of  suspended  ani- 
mation, and  voluntary  interment ;  which  are  also  to  be 
found  narrated  in  more  recent  works — e.g.,  Hudson's  Laiu 
of  Psychic  Phenomena,  pp.  309—20.  There  are  many  such 
cases,  and  it  is  reported  that  a  number  of  persons  have 
been  buried  alive  in  consequence  of  the  inability  of  the 
attending  physician  to  distinguish  the  induced  state  from 
true  death.  It  is  not  to  be  wondered  at ;  and  until  these 
states  and  conditions  receive  the  study  and  attention 
they  deserve,  such  cases  of  premature  interment  will 
probably  continue  to  occur. 

When  we  come  to  inquire  into  the  immediate  causes 
of  catalepsy  and  allied  states,  we  find  that  very  little  is 
known  about  these  conditions.  Dr.  Alexander  Wilder, 
in  his  Perils  of  Premature  Burial,  p.  19,  says  that: — 

"  We  exhaust  our  energies  by  overwork,  by  excitement,  too  mucli 
fatigue  of  the  brain,  the  use  of  tobacco,  and  sedatives  and  anaesthetics, 
and  by  habits  and  practices  which  hasten  the  Three  Sisters  in 
spinning  the  fatal  thread.  Apoplexy,  palsy,  epilepsy,  arc  likely  to 
prostrate  any  of  us  at  any  moment ;  and  catalepsy,  jDerhaps,  is  not 
far  from  any  of  us." 


TRANCE,  CATALEPSY,  &c.  53 

Again,  Dr.  W.  R.  Gowers,  in  Quain's  Dictionary  of 
Medicine,  p.  216,  says : — 

"  Nervous  exhaustion  is  the  common  predisponent ;  and  emotional 
disturbance,  especially  religious  excitement,  or  sudden  alarm,  and 
blows  on  the  head  and  back,  are  frequent  immediate  causes." 

Dr.  James  Curry,  on  the  other  hand,  thinks  that 
fainting  fits  and  losses  of  blood  are  the  chief  factors  in 
inducing  these  death-counterfeits.  (See  Ohservations  on 
Apparent  Death,  pp.  81,  82.)  M.  Charles  Londe,  in 
Za  Mart  Apparente,  p.   16,   says:  — 

"Intense  cold,  coincident  with  privations  and  fatigue,  will  pro- 
duce all  the  phenomena  of  apparent  death.  .  .  ."  ^ 

Struve,  in  his  essay  on  Suspended  Animation,  p.  140, 
takes  the  same  view.  It  has  frequently  been  pointed 
out  that  the  sequeloe  of  certain  diseases,  the  use  of 
narcotics,  &c.,  will  result  in  states  that  cannot  be  dis- 
tinguished from  death.  These  cases  of  suspended  ani- 
mation will  sometimes  last  for  many  days,  as  has 
frequently  been  shown;  and  if  the  body  be  buried 
during  this  interval,  we  should  have  a  case  of  "  prema- 
ture burial." 

How  long  may  a  body  cease  to  show  signs  of  life,  and 
yet  be  revived  ?  That  is  a  much  disputed  point ;  but 
there  can  be  no  question  that,  if  air  be  permitted  access  to 
the  body  of  the  patient,  it  can  be  revived  after  a  very 
long  period — a  period  not  of  hours,  but  of  days  and 
weeks.  Indeed,  Sir  Benjamin  Ward  Richardson  said  on 
this  point : — 

"We  are  at  this  moment  ignorant  of  the  time  when  vitality 
ceases  to  act  upon  matter  that  has  been  vitalised.  Presuming  that 
an  organism  can  be  arrested  in  its  living  in  such  manner  that  its 
parts  shall  not  be  injured  to  the  extent  of  actual  destruction  of 


*  We  have  considered  freezing  to  death  on  p.  115. 


54  DEATH 

tissue,  or  change  of  organic  form,  the  vital  ^vave  seems  ever  ready 
to  pour  into  the  body  again  so  soon  as  the  conditions  for  its 
action  are  re-established.  Thus,  in  some  of  my  experiments  for 
suspending  the  conditions  essential  for  the  visible  manifestations  of 
life  in  cold-blooded  animals,  I  have  succeeded  in  re-establishing  the 
condition  under  which  the  vital  vibrations  will  influence,  after  a 
lapse  not  of  hours,  but  even  of  days ;  and  for  my  part  I  know  no 
limitation  to  such  re-manifestation,  except  from  the  simple  ignorance 
of  us  who  inquire  into  the  subject."  ^ 

Assuredly  this  is  a  significant  admission  !  In  the  light 
of  this  fact,  certain  historic  cases  of  "  raising  the  dead  " 
might  be  re-interpreted,  and  put  upon  a  rational  basis. 
There  can  be  no  doubt  that  re-animation  has  taken  place 
after  very  long  intervals  on  occasion — even  when  there 
has  been  no  external  sign  of  life  in  the  interval.  Of 
course  the  time  would  be  comparatively  brief,  if  the 
supply  of  air  were  cut  off.  In  a  coffin  of  the  usual 
dimensions,  it  has  been  estimated  that  from  twenty- 
minutes  to  an  hour  would  insure  death  from  suffocation. 
But  even  here  we  must  allow,  as  Tebb  and  Vollum  point 
out  [Premature  Burial,  p.  211),  for  a  certain  persistence  of 
the  vital  energy,  which  continues  after  all  atmospheric 
air  has  been  cut  off. 

"  Experiments  on  dogs  show  that  the  average  duration  of  the 
respiratory  movements  after  the  animal  has  been  deprived  of  air  is 
four  minutes  five  seconds.  The  duration  of  the  heart's  action  is 
seven  minutes  eleven  seconds.  The  average  of  the  heart's  action 
after  the  animal  has  ceased  to  make  respiratory  efforts  is  three 
minutes  fifteen  seconds.  These  experiments  further  showed  that 
a  dog  may  be  deprived  of  air  during  three  minutes  fifty  seconds, 
and  afterwards  recover  without  the  application  of  artificial 
means. "  - 

^  Ministry  of  Health,  pp.  154-5. 

2  Report  on  "  Suspended  Animation,"  by  a  Committee  of  the  Royal  Med. 
Chirur.  Society,  July  12,  1862. 


TRANCE,  CATALEPSY,  &c.  55 

It  may  be  said  that  with  modern  improvements,  and 
with  the  aid  of  artificial  stimulants,  this  period  has  been 
very  greatly  exceeded. 

It  may  be  objected  to  all  that  we  have  said  that,  in 
practically  all  instances,  death  would  take  place  within 
a  very  few  minutes  in  any  case — even  if  the  patient  woke 
and  found  himself  in  the  coffin.  Why,  then,  make  all  this 
fuss  ?  Apart  from  the  humanitarian  side  of  the  question, 
there  is  often  the  definite  possibility  of  resuscitating  the 
patient — if  the  case  be  taken  in  time.  And  then,  forty 
minutes  must  be  a  veritable  eternity  to  one  buried 
alive !  In  a  case  of  cremation,  even  if  the  patient  did 
revive  in  the  coffin,  death  would  be  so  speedy  that 
it  would  almost  be  at  hand  before  the  situation  was 
realised. 

In  this  connection  we  desire  to  call  attention  to  certain 
facts  of  interest  that  are  to  be  noted  in  the  animal  world. 
Professor  S.  J.  Holmes,  writing  in  the  Fojndar  Science 
Monthly,  for  February  1908,  calls  attention  to  the 
instinct  of  feigning  death  among  various  animals  and 
insects.  Some  of  them  assume  attitudes  that  render 
them  almost  indistinguishable  from  their  surroundings ; 
others  draw  themselves  up  into  a  ball ;  still  others 
remain  in  a  state  of  apparent  catalepsy,  in  whatever 
attitude  they  are  placed,  this  state  lasting  for  an  hour 
or  even  longer.  It  is  interesting  to  note  in  this  con- 
nection that  the  attitudes  assumed  by  these  various 
animals  at  such  times  often  bear  no  resemblance  to  the 
attitudes  they  assume  in  death.  Darwin  observed  this, 
and  said : — 

"  I  carefully  noted  the  simulated  positions  of  seventeen  different 
kinds  of  insects  belonging  to  different  genera,  both  poor  and  first- 
rate  shammers.  Afterwards  I  procured  naturally  dead  specimens 
of  some  of  these  insects  (including  an  lulus,  spider,  and  Oniscus) 
belonging  to  distinct  genera,  others  I  killed  with  camphor  by  an 


56  DEATH 

easy  slow  death  ;  the  result  was  that  in  no  instance  was  the  attitude 
exactly  the  same,  and  in  several  instances  the  attitudes  of  the 
feigners  and  of  the  really  dead  were  as  unlike  as  they  could 
possibly  be." 

Professor  Holmes  does  not  consider  that  in  the  insects 
at  least,  this  feigning  of  death  is  a  conscious  impulse, 
but  rather  of  the  nature  of  a  reflex  action.  He  states 
that  the  mere  handling  or  touching  of  certain  insects — 
for  example,  the  water  scorpion — will  cause  them  to 
feign  death  for  an  hour,  even  if  they  are  left  entirely 
alone,  or  covered  up,  and  their  tormentor  leaves  the 
room.  It  is  interesting  to  note,  in  this  connection,  that 
these  creatures  cannot  be  made  to  feign  death  by  any 
amount  of  handling  under  water.  As  soon  as  they  are 
in  the  air,  however,  they  feign  death  repeatedly.  As 
soon  as  the  state  has  worn  off,  if  they  are  touched 
again,  they  again  feign  death  for  an  hour  or  so, 
and  this  may  be  repeated  a  number  of  times  in  suc- 
cession. 

Among  the  higher  animals,  on  the  contrary,  such  as 
the  fox,  it  would  appear  that  this  instinct  is  largely  an 
act  of  consciousness,  and  that  they  are  perfectly  aware  of 
their  surroundings,  and  of  the  reason  for  their  feigning 
in  this  manner.  A  fox,  when  feigning  death,  will  often 
cautiously  open  its  eyes,  raise  its  head,  look  around,  and 
finally  scamper  off,  if  its  pursuers  have  withdra^vn  to  a 
safe  distance. 

It  would  appear  that,  in  the  majority  of  cases, 
especially  among  the  insects,  the  induced  state  re- 
sembles that  of  catalepsy ;  the  muscular  rigidity 
noticed — which  is  intense — would  indicate  this,  and 
the  fact  that  they  suffer  a  great  amount  of  maltreat- 
ment (pricking,  mutilation,  burning,  &c.)  without  show- 
ing any  signs  of  sensibility,  would  seem  to  show  that 
this  is  lost,  and  that  more  or  less  complete  anaesthesia  is 


TRANCE,  CATALEPSY,  &c.  57 

present.  The  state  is  probably  closely  akin  to  what  has 
been  called  "  hypnotism  "  in  the  lower  animals.  Practi- 
cally nothing  is  known  of  that  condition  of  the  nervous 
system  which  makes  such  results  possible,  and  this  is  as 
true  of  the  higher  as  of  the  lower  creatures. 


CHAPTER  IV 

PREMATURE  BURIAL 

1.  Cases. 

We  have  seen,  as  the  result  of  the  two  preceding  chapters, 
that  there  is  no  certain  sign  of  death  (with  the  single 
exception  of  putrefaction,  which  is  not  generally  w^aited 
for),  and  that  there  are,  on  the  contrary,  many  states  and 
conditions  which  very  closely  simulate  death ;  that,  for 
days  in  fact,  it  is  almost  impossible  to  distinguish  true 
from  false  death — so  similar  are  they.  The  question  here 
arises,  Is  it  not  possible,  and  in  fact  probable,  that  in 
certain  cases  a  living  person  is  buried  by  mistake,  under 
the  impression  that  he  is  dead  ?  Might  it  not  be  quite 
possible  that  accidents  of  the  sort  occur  and  premature 
burial  take  place  ?  It  would  certainly  seem  that  such 
must  be  the  case  ;  and  when  we  turn  to  an  account  of  the 
actual  facts  we  find  that  such  has  happened  very  fre- 
quently. It  is  improbable  that  premature  burial  takes 
place  as  frequently  as  it  did  some  years  ago,  but  it  is 
doubtless  true  that  many  cases  are  on  record,  amply 
testifying  to  the  fact  that  it  has  occurred  with  horrible 
frequency,  from  time  to  time,  in  the  past.  A  large 
number  of  such  cases,  authenticated  more  or  less  fully, 
are  to  be  found  in  Tebb  and  Vollum's  Premature  Burial, 
in  Franz  Hartmann's  Buried  Alive,  and  in  the  Encyclo- 
'pcedia  of  Death,  vol.  ii.,  pp.  7-114.  A  great  mass  of 
cases  are  here  adduced ;  and,  although  Dr.  David  Walsh 

58 


PREMATURE  BURIAL  59 

attacked  the  evidence  in  his  Httle  book,  Premature  Burial, 
there  can  be  no  doubt  that  a  large  number  of  the  cases 
printed  stand  the  test  of  scrutiny,  and  are  veritable  cases 
of  "  premature  burial."  Similar  cases  are  coming  to  the 
attention  of  the  public  from  time  to  time  continually, 
and  it  is  surely  high  time  that  some  means  be  adopted  to 
check  this  evil.  It  is  true  that  there  is  a  Society  for  the 
Prevention  of  Premature  Burial — both  in  England  and 
America — but  it  is  unable  to  accomplish  much,  owing  to 
the  tyranny  that  it  has  encountered  in  more  than  one 
direction.  Such  a  movement  deserves  the  whole-hearted 
support  of  the  people ;  and  we  shall  now  endeavour  to 
lay  before  the  reader  our  reason  for  taking  this  stand 
so  strongly. 

Nothinof  that  the  human  mind  can  conceive  can 
appeal  to  the  imagination  as  more  horrible  than  the 
idea  of  premature  burial.  To  awake  in  a  coffin — cold, 
dark,  and  helpless — far  beneath  the  surface  of  the  ground, 
and  know  that  the  living  tomb  is  one  from  which  it  is 
impossible  to  escape,  suggests  a  tragedy  that  is  in  every 
sense  appalling.  If  we  attempt  to  picture  such  a  fate,  it 
is  easy  to  comprehend  how  the  agony  of  a  whole  lifetime 
may  be  compressed  within  the  few  minutes  that  elapse 
between  the  moment  when  the  victim  awakes  to  the 
horror  of  his  position  and  the  time  when  he  again  lapses 
into  unconsciousness,  as  the  effect  of  suffocation.  It  is 
not  strange  that  such  a  subject  should  have  appealed  to 
the  writer  of  realistic  fiction,  but  we  must  not  imagine 
that  these  cases  occur  only  in  the  pages  of  the  sensational 
novel.  In  writing  upon  this  subject.  Professor  R.  L.  0. 
Roehrig,  formerly  of  Cornell  University,  said  : — 

"The  possibility  of  premature  burial  always  exists,  for  that  there 
is  real  danger  of  been  buried,  embalmed,  dissected,  or  cremated 
alive  has  been  fully  acknowledged  by  various  unquestionable,  highly 
respectable  authorities,  and  many  celebrated  authors  have  written 


60  DEATH 

on  this  particularly  important  subject,  among  them  Alexander 
Humboldt,  Hartmann,  and  Hufeland.  All  have  shown  that  in  every 
case  of  death  which  cannot  be  plainly  accounted  for  by  violent 
external  causes,  fatal  vulnerations,  accidents  by  firearms  or  other 
deadly  weapons,  suicide  or  murder,  it  is  of  the  utmost  importance 
to  abstain  from  all  sudden  alarm  and  meddlesome  interference,  and 
most  patiently  to  wait  until  every  possible  doubt  as  to  the  real  and 
entire  extinction  of  life  has  been  absolutely  removed. 

"  Under  no  conditions  should  the  fear  of  ridicule,  supercilious 
contempt,  or  mockery  coming  from  the  thoughtless,  or  any  other 
sort  of  intimidation,  influence  us  in  our  conduct  on  so  grave  an 
occasion.  Nobody  can  be  certain  that  he  will  not  at  some  time 
have  to  undergo  this  horrible  misfortune,  for  the  most  celebrated 
and  experienced  physicians  have  been  misled  by  appearances,  while 
even  the  assertions  of  the  public  inspectors  of  the  dead  have  often 
led  to  the  most  deplorable  consequences." 

Prone  as  tlie  scientist  may  be  to  question  the  accuracy 
of  the  assertion  that,  at  the  smallest  average,  one  person 
is  buried  alive  in  the  United  States  every  twenty-four 
hours,  it  is  important  to  note  that  the  London  Humane 
Society  has  reported  the  fact  of  having  brought  back  to 
Hfe  no  less  than  2175  apparently  dead  persons  within 
a  term  of  twenty-two  years ;  that  a  similar  society  in 
Amsterdam  restored  990  persons  in  twenty-five  years; 
and  that  the  Hamburg  Society  saved  107  persons  from 
premature  burial  in  less  than  five  years.  Personally,  we 
know  of  several  cases  of  this  kind,  and,  in  one  instance,  a 
prominent  New  York  physician  recently  discovered  to  his 
horror  that  the  body  that  he  was  dissecting  was  that  of  a 
live  man.  Professor  Roehrig,  who  asserts  that  he  has 
saved  many  persons  from  this  fate,  states  that  he  once 
rescued  a  child  from  the  dissecting  table,  in  spite  of  the 
insulting  mockery  of  all  the  other  physicians  who  were  in 
attendance.  In  view  of  these  facts,  it  is  not  difficult  to 
believe  that  the  following  gruesome  experience,  related 


PREMATURE  BURIAL  61 

by  a  French  physician  in  the  Paris  Figaro,  may  be  fact, 
not  fiction : — 

"Five  years  ago,"  he  writes,  "I  was  preparing  for  an  examina- 
tion, and  went  one  night  alone  into  the  dissecting  room  for  the 
purpose  of  studying  certain  abdominal  viscera,  carrying  a  light  in 
my  hand.  An  insane  woman,  having  died  on  the  day  before,  was 
extended  naked  upon  the  marble  slab.  I  placed  my  candle  upon 
her  chest,  and  made  a  cut  through  the  skin  over  the  stomach.  At 
that  moment  the  supposed  corpse  gave  a  terrible  scream,  and, 
rising  up,  caused  the  light  to  fall  and  become  extinguished.  Then 
a  terrible  struggle  began  ;  the  woman,  with  one  of  her  cold,  clammy 
hands  took  hold  of  my  hair,  and  with  the  other  clawed  my  face 
with  her  finger  nails.  I  was  beside  myself  with  terror,  and  blindly 
struck  about  me  with  the  scalpel  which  I  still  held  in  my  hand. 
Suddenly  my  knife  struck  an  obstacle ;  a  sigh  followed,  the  grasp 
on  my  hair  was  loosened,  I  fainted,  and  knew  nothing  more.  When 
I  aAvoke  it  was  daylight,  and  I  found  myself  upon  the  floor  lying 
beside  the  bloody  corpse  of  the  woman  whom  I  had  killed,  as  my 
knife  had  gone  directly  to  her  heart.  I  replaced  the  corpse  upon 
the  table  and  said  jiothing  about  it ;  but  the  recollection  of  this 
event  fills  me  with  horror,  while  the  marks  which  the  nails  left 
upon  my  face  are  still  there." 

It  has  been  pretty  authoritatively  asserted  that  Mdlle. 
Rachel,  the  celebrated  actress,  was  embalmed  while  still 
alive,  and  there  are  those  who  will  always  believe  that 
Washington  Irving  Bishop,  the  distinguished  mind-reader, 
died  from  the  effects  of  an  autopsy  performed  while  the 
unfortunate  man  was  in  one  of  the  trances  to  which  he 
was  frequently  subject.  It  is  also  stated  that  the  mother 
of  the  famous  General  Lee  was  buried  alive  and  resusci- 
tated two  years  before  his  birth.  Although  pronounced 
to  be  dead  by  her  physician,  she  regained  consciousness 
suflficiently  during  the  process  of  interment  to  attract  the 
attention  of  the  sexton.  Ebcnezer  Erskine,  one  of  the 
founders  of  the  (United)  Free  Church  of  Scotland,  is  also 


62  DEATH 

said  to  have  been  born  after  the  burial  of  his  mother. 
As  in  the  case  of  Mrs.  Lee,  Mrs.  Erskine  was  buried  while 
in  a  trance.  As  the  gravedigger  had  noticed  that  there 
was  a  valuable  ring  on  one  of  her  fingers  he  determined 
to  secure  it,  and,  stealing  to  the  new-made  grave  during 
the  night,  he  removed  and  opened  the  casket,  and  cut  off 
the  finger  on  which  the  ring  had  been  placed.  It  was  by 
this  act  of  felony  that  her  life  was  saved. 

A  comparatively  short  time  ago,  George  Hefdecker,  a 
farmer  living  near  Erie,  Pa.,  died  suddenly  of  what  was 
supposed  to  be  heart  failure.  The  body  was  buried 
temporarily  in  a  neighbour's  lot  in  the  Erie  Cemetery, 
and  when,  some  time  later,  the  transfer  to  a  newly- 
purchased  family  lot  was  made,  the  casket  was  opened  at 
the  request  of  the  relatives.  To  their  horror  it  was  then 
discovered  that  the  body  had  turned  completely  round, 
and  the  face,  as  well  as  the  interior  of  the  coffin,  bore 
unmistakable  traces  of  the  terrible  struggle  that  had 
occurred. 

A  similar  story  comes  from  St.  Petersburg,  Russia,  in 
connection  with  the  interment  at  Tioobayn,  near  that 
city,  of  a  peasant  girl  named  Antonova.  She  had  pre- 
sumably died,  and  was  buried,  but  after  the  gravedigger 
had  completed  his  work  he  was  startled  by  sounds  that 
seemed  to  come  from  the  new-made  grave.  Instead  of 
removing  the  coffin  and  breaking  it  open,  however,  he 
rushed  off  to  find  a  doctor,  and  when  he  and  the  public 
officials  arrived  it  was  too  late.  The  casket  contained  a 
corpse,  but,  as  the  position  of  the  body  clearly  proved, 
death  had  only  just  taken  place. 

When  the  question  of  premature  burial  came  up  for 
discussion  before  the  French  Senate  some  years  ago,  a 
most  remarkable  story  was  told  under  oath  by  Cardinal 
Archbishop  Donnot.  In  part,  his  testimony  was  as 
follows : — 


PREMATURE  BURIAL  63 

"  In  the  summer  of  1826,  on  the  close  of  a  summer  day,  in  a 
church  which  was  exceedingly  crowded,  a  young  priest  who  was 
in  the  act  of  preaching  was  suddenly  seized  with  giddiness  in  the 
pulpit.  The  words  he  was  uttering  became  indistinct;  he  soon 
lost  the  power  of  speech,  and  sank  down  on  the  floor.  He  was 
taken  out  of  the  church  and  carried  home.  All  was  thought  to 
be  over.  Some  hours  after  the  funeral  bell  was  tolled,  and  the 
usual  preparations  made  for  the  interment.  His  eyesight  was 
gone ;  but  if  he  could  see  nothing,  he  could  hear,  and  I  need  not 
say  that  what  reached  his  ears  was  not  calculated  to  reassure  him. 
The  doctor  came,  examined  him,  and  pronounced  him  dead ;  and 
after  the  usual  inquiries  as  to  his  age,  the  place  of  his  birth,  &c., 
gave  permission  for  his  interment  the  next  morning.  The  vener- 
able bishop,  in  whose  cathedral  the  young  priest  was  preaching 
when  he  was  seized  with  the  fit,  came  to  the  bedside  to  recite  the 
'  De  Profundis.'  The  body  was  measured  for  the  coffin.  Night 
came  on,  and  you  can  easily  feel  how  inexpressible  was  the 
anguish  of  the  living  being  in  such  a  situation.  At  last,  amid 
the  voices  murmuring  around  him,  he  distinguished  that  of  one 
whom  he  had  known  from  infancy.  That  voice  produced  a  mar- 
vellous effect,  and  he  made  a  superhuman  effort.  Of  what  followed 
I  need  only  say  that  the  seemingly  dead  man  stood  next  day  in 
the  same  pulpit.  That  young  priest,  gentlemen,  is  the  same  man 
who  is  now  sj^eaking  before  you,  and  who,  more  than  forty  years 
after  that  event,  implores  those  in  authority  not  merely  to  watch 
vigilantly  over  the  careful  execution  of  the  legal  prescriptions  with 
regard  to  interments,  but  to  enact  fresh  ones  in  order  to  i)revent 
the  occurrence  of  irreparable  misfortunes." 

Bouchut,  in  his  Les  Signcs  de  la  Mort,  p.  43,  gives  the 
following  case : — 

"A  person  of  high  standing  was  taken  with  one  of  those 
diseases  in  which  death  usually  does  not  occur  suddenly,  but  is 
preceded  by  certain  signs.  The  physician  who  attended  him 
found  him  one  evening  in  a  dangerous  state,  and  when  he  visited 
him  again  the  following  morning,  he  was  told  upon  entering  the 
house  that  the  patient  had  died  during  the  night.     They  had  the 


64  DEATH 

body  already  placed  in  the  coffin ;  but  the  doctor,  doubting  that 
death  could  occur  so  suddenly,  caused  the  supposed  '  dead '  to  be 
put  back  into  bed.  The  man  soon  revived,  and  lived  for  many 
years  afterward." 

Dr.  Hartmann  gives  the  two  following  cases  collected 
by  himself,  and  published  in  his  Buried  Alive,  pp. 
52,  53:— 

"  At  Wels  (Austria)  a  woman  died,  and  as  no  signs  of  putre- 
faction appeared  at  the  end  of  five  days,  all  sorts  of  means  were 
resorted  to  to  revive  the  body.  They  were  of  no  avail,  and  it  was 
finally  resolved  not  to  delay  the  burying  any  longer.  On  the 
night  preceding  the  funeral  a  large  crowd  met  for  the  purpose  of 
holding  the  'Wake.'  It  was  a  merry  party,  and  some  of  those 
present  got  drunk  and  amused  themselves  in  making  jests  with 
the  corpse  and  offering  it  liquor.  In  the  midst  of  the  merry- 
making, the  woman  woke  and  sat  up  in  her  coffin  !  The  company 
ran  away,  and  when  they  returned  they  found  that  the  woman 
had  gone  to  bed,  where  she  slept,  and  was  well  the  next  day. 
She  had  been  conscious  of  all  that  had  taken  place,  but  had  not 
been  able  to  move. 

"In  another  town  in  Austria,  a  student  made  a  bet  that  he 
would  not  be  afraid  to  go  at  night  to  the  graveyard,  open  a  grave, 
steal  the  corpse,  and  carry  it  to  his  room.  This  he  did  accord- 
ingly, and  the  grave  he  opened  happened  to  be  that  of  a  young 
girl  who  had  been  buried  on  the  previous  day.  He  took  the  body 
upon  his  shoulders  and  carried  it  to  his  room,  where  he  put  it 
upon  a  lounge  near  the  stove.  He  then  went  to  sleej).  During 
the  night  he  was  awakened  by  a  noise.  The  girl  had  awakened 
from  her  trance,  and  was  sitting  up.  He  was  so  much  terrified 
that  his  hair  turned  white ;  but  the  girl,  thus  saved,  returned  to 
her  parents." 

Sometimes  the  termination  of  such  cases  is  not  so  for- 
tunate, however.  It  Avill  bo  observed  that  in  the  following 
case,  reported  in  the  British  Medical  Journal,  April  26, 
1884,  p.  844,  death  resulted  from  the  interment: — 


PREMATURE  BURIAL  65 

"The  Times  of  India,  for  March  21,  has  the  following  story  : — 
'■  On  last  Friday  morning  the  father  of  a  large  family  at  Goa, 
named  Manuel,  aged  seventy  years,  who  had  been  for  the  last 
four  months  suffering  from  dysentery,  appearing  to  be  dead,  pre- 
parations were  made  for  the  burial.  He  was  placed  in  a  coffin  and 
taken  from  his  house  at  Worlee  to  a  chapel  at  Lower  Mahim, 
preparatory  to  burial.  The  priest,  on  putting  his  hand  on  the 
man's  chest,  found  his  heart  still  beating.  He  was  thereupon 
removed  to  the  Jamsetjee  Jejeebhoy  Hospital,  where  he  remained 
in  an  unconscious  state  up  to  a  late  hour  on  last  Friday  night, 
when  he  died.' " 

The  following  case  is  quoted  in  Tebb  and  Vollum's 
Premature  Burial,  p.  55  : — 

"A  young  married  woman  residing  at  Salon  died  shortly  after 
her  confinement  in  August  last.  The  medical  man,  who  was 
hastily  summoned  when  her  illness  assumed  a  dangerous  form, 
certified  her  death,  and  recommended  immediate  burial  in  conse- 
quence of  the  intense  heat  then  prevailing,  and  six  hours  after- 
wards the  body  was  interred.  A  few  days  since,  the  husband 
having  resolved  to  re-marry,  the  mother  of  his  late  wife  desired 
to  have  her  daughter's  remains  removed  to  her  native  town, 
Marseilles.  When  the  vault  was  opened,  a  horrible  sight  pre- 
sented itself.  The  corpse  lay  in  the  middle  of  the  vault,  with 
dishevelled  hair,  and  linen  torn  to  pieces.  It  evidently  had  been 
gnawed  by  the  unfortunate  victim.  The  shock  which  the  dreadful 
spectacle  caused  to  the  mother  has  been  so  great  that  fears  are 
entertained  for  her  reason,  if  not  for  her  life." 

Another  remarkable  case  is  the  following  {Encyclo- 
pcedia  of  Death,  vol.  ii.,  p.  107): — 

"  Thirty-four  years  ago,  a  man  by  the  name  of  John  Hurelle 
was  pronounced  dead  by  three  doctors,  who  held  an  examination. 
Everything  was  prej)ared  for  the  funeral ;  the  guests  were  invited, 
a  clergyman  summoned,  and  the  body  placed  in  a  coftin.     On  the 

E 


66  DEATH 

morning  when  the  funeral  was  to  occur,  the  mother  thought  she 
saw  signs  of  life,  though  four  days  had  passed  since  he  was  said 
to  have  been  dead.  The  funeral  did  not  take  place.  When  those 
present  took  the  seemingly  lifeless  body  and  placed  it  on  a  bed, 
the  man  said  :  '  Let  me ' — and  then  stopped.  For  eight  months 
he  lay  in  a  sort  of  stupor,  while  his  mother  gave  him  nourish- 
ment. At  the  expiration  of  that  time  he  regained  consciousness, 
and  finished  the  sentence  by  saying  '  be.' " 

Another  case  collected  by  Dr.  Hartmann  himself,  is 
the  following : — 

"  In  a  small  town  in  Prussia,  an  undertaker,  living  within  the 
limits  of  the  cemetery,  heard  during  the  night  cries  proceeding 
from  within  a  grave  in  which  a  person  had  been  buried  on  the 
previous  day.  Not  daring  to  interfere  without  permission,  he 
went  to  the  police  and  reported  the  matter.  When,  after  a  great 
deal  of  delay,  the  required  formalities  were  fulfilled  and  per- 
mission granted  to  open  the  grave,  it  was  found  that  the  man 
had  been  buried  alive ;  but  he  was  now  dead.  His  body,  which 
had  been  cold  at  the  time  of  the  burial,  was  now  warm  and  bleed- 
ing from  many  wounds,  where  he  had  skinned  his  hands  and  head 
in  his  struggles  to  free  himself  before  suffocation  made  an  end  to 
his  misery." 

"In  the  month  of  December  1842,  an  inhabitant  of  Eyures,  in 
France,  died  and  was  buried.  A  few  days  afterwards  a  rumour 
began  to  spread  that  his  death  was  due  to  an  overdose  of  opium 
having  been  given  to  him  by  a  physician.  Finally,  the  autho- 
rities ordered  the  grave  to  be  opened,  and  it  was  found  that  the 
supposed  dead  man  had  awakened  and  oj^ened  with  his  teeth  the 
veins  of  his  arm  for  the  purpose  of  ending  his  torture,  and  then 
he  had  died  in  his  coffin."  —  (Lenormand,  Des  Inhumations 
Precipitees,  p.   78.) 

Many  persons  seem  to  think  that  premature  burials 
are  few  and  far  between.  There  was  never  a  greater 
fallacy,  says  M.  Tozer  : — 


PREMATURE  BURIAL  67 

"  Some  years  ago  the  Paris  Figaro  dealt  at  considerable  length 
mth  the  subject  of  the  possibility  of  premature  burial  occurring 
somewhat  frequently,  and  within  fifteen  days  the  editor  received 
over  four  hundred  letters  from  different  parts  of  France,  all  from 
persons  who  either  had  been  almost  buried  alive,  or  who  knew  of 
such  cases."  ^ 

Dr.  Franz  Hartmann,  immediately  after  the  publica- 
tion of  his  book  on  the  subject,  and  within  two  months 
(May — June,  1896),  received  no  less  than  sixty- three 
letters  from  persons  who  had  escaped  premature  burial 
throuofh  fortunate  accident.  When  such  wholesale 
numbers  are  observed,  what  are  we  to  think  but  that 
premature  burial,  so  far  from  being  a  great  rarity,  is  a 
frequent  phenomenon — happening  constantly  in  our  very 
midst  ? 

In  an  article  in  the  Insurance  Ncivs  for  April  1,  1901, 
George  T.  Angell,  founder  and  president  of  the  American 
Humane  Education  Society,  says  that 

"Nothing  can  be  more  certain  than  that  large  numbers  (and 
perhaps  multitudes)  of  persons  have  been  buried  alive,  and  that 
many,  after  having  been  pronounced  dead,  have  shown  signs  of 
life  in  time  to  save  themselves  from  such  burial,  and  have  declared 
that,  lohile  unable  to  move  they  lueve  fully  conscious,  of  ivhat  was 
said  and  done  about  them.  My  own  father  barely  escaped  such 
burial,  being  declared  by  his  physicians  dead.  There  are  in 
Boston  alone  many  thousands  of  persons  living  in  hotels  and 
boarding-houses  where,  whenever  death  is  declared,  every  effort 
will  be  made  to  send  the  body  of  the  supposed  deceased,  at  the 
earliest  possible  moment,  to  the  undertaker,  the  crematory,  or  the 
grave.  In  not  one  case  in  a  hundred  will  the  body  be  permitted 
to  remain  in  th6  hotel  or  boarding-house  until  the  beginning  of 
decay." 

Dr.  Henry  J.  Garrigues,  of  New  York  City,  m  a  paper 

^  Premature  Burial^  by  Basil  Tozer,  p.  IG. 


68  DEATH 

read  before  the  Society  of  Medical  Jurisprudence,  con- 
tended that  any  law  permitting  burial  without  thorough 
tests  to  determine  the  extinction  of  life  was  nothing 
short  of  homicidal.  Under  the  law  of  "  necessary 
precautions,"  he  said,  "  there  is  nothing  to  prevent 
anybody  from  being  buried  alive  or  frozen  to  death 
in  an  undertaker's  ice-box."  His  objection  to  the  laws 
that  now  exist  so  generally  throughout  the  country  is 
based  upon  the  fact  that  they  are  designed  to  protect 
the  community,  without  regard  to  the  protection  of  the 
person  supposed  to  be  dead.  "  And  yet,"  as  Dr.  Gar- 
rigues  admitted,  "  the  question  of  whether  a  person  is 
dead  or  alive  is  most  difficult  to  decide.  If  the  action 
of  the  vital  organs  is  suspended,  every  appearance  of 
death  may  be  produced,  when,  under  proper  manipu- 
lation, they  may  be  restored  to  life." 

In  citing  the  counterfeits  of  death.  Dr.  Garrigues 
referred  to  persons  who,  though  taken  from  the  water 
apparently  dead,  were  afterwards  resuscitated,  and  he 
stated  the  belief  that,  if  it  were  not  so  common  to  believe 
that  people  were  dead  merely  because  they  were  cold 
and  limp,  many  others  would  be  revived.  Asphyxiation, 
heart  failure,  apoplexy,  intoxication,  lightning  stroke, 
anaesthetics,  narcotics,  concussion — all  these  produced 
the  counterfeits  of  death,  and  often  so  closely  resembled 
it  that  the  science  and  the  experience  of  the  physician 
were  frequently  at  fault.  Thus  the  danger  of  mistaking 
live  persons  for  dead  remains,  even  after  all  tests  for 
determining  death  have  been  tried.  There  is  not  one 
but  which  may  fail  under  certain  conditions.  The  most 
common  test  of  all,  that  of  trying  to  ascertain  if  the 
breath  has  stopped,  is  the  one  that  is  usually  made, 
and  yet  science  knows  of  many  cases  of  suspended 
animation  where  breathing  has  ceased  for  fully  forty- 
eight  hours.     The  same  is  true  regarding  the  stopping 


PREMATURE  BURIAL  69 

ot  the  heart,  and  so  on  through  the  entire  list.  There 
have  been  cases  of  suspended  animation  in  which  all 
signs  have  failed,  and  yet  the  patient  recovered.  In 
his  opinion,  the  only  sure  indication  of  death  is  the 
decomposition  of  the  body. 

Dr.  Garrigues'  opinions  upon  this  subject  were  fully 
upheld  by  Dr.  John  Dixwell,  of  Harvard  University. 
In  an  address  before  the  Committee  on  Legal  Affairs 
of  the  Massachusetts  Legislature,  February  12,  1908, 
he  stated  that  he  personally  had  narrowly  escaped 
premature  burial.  "  During  an  illness,  in  the  early 
seventies,"  he  said,  "  very  eminent  physicians  determined 
that  I  was  dead,  but  I  am  alive  to-day,  while  they 
all  are  dead.  Accordingly  I  know  that  this  horror  exists 
as  a  fact.  It  is  ridiculous  to  dispute  it.  I  recall  a  case 
at  the  Massachusetts  General  Hospital.  A  woman  had 
been  sent  there  suffering  from  bronchitis.  After  a  time 
it  was  decided  that  she  was  dead,  and  she  was  sent  to  the 
morgue.  There  she  suddenly  woke  up,  and  is  alive 
to-day." 

"  I  have  often  been  told,"  says  Dr.  Alexander  Wilder/  "  that  the 
modern  practice  of  embalming  made  death  certain.  I  admit  it ; 
but  those  who  are  too  poor  to  pay  for  this  funeral  luxury  must 
yet  take  the  chance  in  the  old-fashioned  way.  There  is  no  doubt, 
however,  that  the  number  annually  put  to  death  by  the  enibalmers 
is  sufhciently  large  to  demand  attention.  An  investigator  of  this 
subject  in  New  York  has  openly  declared  his  belief  that  a  con- 
siderable number  of  human  beings  are  annually  killed  in  America 
by  the  embalming  process." 

Dr.  Edward  P.  Vollum,  surgeon  in  the  United  States 
Army,  is  another  physician  who  has  written  freely  upon 
the  danger  of  premature  burial.  In  addition  to  colla- 
borating with  Tebb  in  compiling  a  book  upon  this  subject, 

*  Burying  Alive  a  Frequent  Peril,  p.  I'J. 


70  DEATH 

he  is  the  author  of  several  papers  treating  of  the  dangers 
of  burial  alive,  from  one  of  which  we  quote : — 

"  Any  one  whose  vital  machinery  is  thrown  out  of  gear  by 
excesses,  strains,  or  depressing  causes  may  pass  into  and  out 
of  this  transitory  state  if  they  have  a  reserve  of  strength.  Shocks 
cause  apparent  death,  such  as  from  gunshot,  strokes  of  lightning, 
charges  of  electricity,  concussion,  heat  and  sun-stroke,  fright, 
intense  excitement,  etc.  So  do  exhaustions  from  mental  and 
physical  exertion,  especially  in  the  badly  nourished,  asphyxia  from 
various  causes,  intense  cold,  anaesthesia,  intoxicants,  haemorrhage, 
narcotism,  convulsive  disorders,  so-called  heart  failures  and  apo- 
plectic seizures,  epilepsy,  and  syncope. 

"The  above  cases  are  quite  plain,  and  many  are  saved  by 
medical  aid.  But  there  are  other  forms  of  this  mysterious  state 
that  may  defy  the  highest  medical  skill  and  all  known  tests  and 
signs.  These  are  the  constitutional  cases,  due  to  some  warp  of 
temperament,  as  seen  in  trance,  catalepsy,  cholera,  auto-hypnotism, 
somnambulism,  &c.,  which,  like  hibernation,  are  inexplicable  by 
any  principles  taught  by  science.  We  know  but  little  of  these 
idiosyncrasies  except  that  they  are  usually  hereditary,  and  that 
their  victims  easily  fall  into  a  deathlike  lethargy  from  overwork, 
worry,  and  foul  air,  and  that  during  their  attacks  efforts  at  resusci- 
tation should  be  kept  up  until  putrefaction  appears,  lest  they  be 
mistaken  for  dead  and  disposed  of  accordingly,  Quain's  Dictionary 
of  Medicine  says :  '  The  duration  of  trance  has  varied  from  a  few 
hours  or  days  to  several  weeks  or  months.'  The  British  medical 
press  during  the  last  fifty  years  has  given  numerous  cases  which 
revived  from  the  consciousness  of  the  preparations  for  closing  the 
coffin.  Many  notables  have  been  subject  to  this  disorder,  such  as 
the  great  anatomist  Winslow,  the  French  Cardinal  Donnet,  and 
Benjamin  Disraeli.  The  last-named  lay  in  this  state  for  a 
week. 

"  All  such  cases  are  in  peril  because  of  their  uncertainty.  Of 
course,  old  cases  of  heart  disease  and  apoplexy  may  be  recognised 
by  the  patient's  physician,  but,  as  a  rule,  the  diagnosis  cannot  be 
sure  without  an  autopsy.  All  signs  of  death  are  deceptive,  and 
all  these  cases  should  be  held  as  not  beyond  resuscitation  until 


PREMATURE  BURIAL  71 

decomposition  appears.  Hufeland  says  :  '  Death  does  not  come 
suddenly;  it  is  a  gradual  process  from  actual  life  to  apparent 
death,  and  from  that  to  actual  death.' 

''  The  revivals  sometimes  reported  during  epidemics  of  cholera, 
small-pox,  and  yellow  fever  depend,  as  in  so-called  sudden  deaths, 
upon  the  fact  that  the  patients  are  usually  struck  down  in  their 
ordinary  health  with  a  reserve  of  strength  which  bridges  them 
over  after  the  force  of  the  disease  is  spent. 

"  The  estimates  of  such  disasters  are  based  upon  the  discoveries 
made  when  the  dead  are  removed  from  cemeteries,  as  is  done 
in  some  great  cities  every  five  years.  A  portion  of  the  skeletons 
are  always  found  turned  to  one  side  or  on  the  face,  twisted, 
or  with  the  hands  up  to  the  head.  These  are  counted  as 
living  burials.  And  then  there  is  the  admittedly  large  number 
of  narrow  escapes  from  being  buried  alive,  recovered,  as  a  rule, 
by  some  chance.  Hidden  and  mixed  with  ignorance,  laxity, 
and  indifference  as  this  whole  matter  is,  the  authorities  naturally 
differ  in  their  views  as  to  the  frequency  of  these  cases.  A 
personal  inquiry  in  Europe  and  in  the  United  States  for  several 
years  past  has  convinced  me  that  they  are  alarmingly  frequent. 
The  proportion  of  discovered  cases  must  be  small  compared 
with  those  that  never  come  to  light.  Dr.  Lionce  Lenormond, 
in  Des  Inhumations  Precipitees,  says  that  a  one-thousandth  part 
of  the  human  race  have  been  and  are  annually  buried  alive. 
M.  le  Guen,  in  Dangers  des  Inhumations  Precipitef^s,  estimates 
premature  burials  at  two  a  thousand.  He  collected  2313 
cases  from  reliable  sources.  Hundreds  of  foreign  authorities 
with  similar  view^s  could  be  given.  Dr.  Moore  Russell  Fletcher, 
in  One  Thousand  Pe7\<07is  Biiried  Alive  hy  Their  Best  Friends 
(Boston,  1890),  gives  many  horrors  taken  from  American 
sources.  Carl  Sextus,  of  New  York,  collected  in  eighteen 
years  1500  cases  of  death  counterfeits  of  scientific  value. 
He  estimates  living  burials  at  two  per  cent." 

We  have  now  given  a  number  of  cases  of  premature 
burial,  or  cases  in  which  burial  would  have  taken  place 
shortly  had  not  some  fortunate  and  unforeseen  accident 


72  DEATH 

happened.  A  number  of  similar  cases  will  be  found 
detailed  in  the  authors  quoted,  and  in  other  works  upon 
the  subject.  Bruhier,  in  his  work,  Dissertations  sur 
V Incertitude  cles  Signcs  de  la  Mort,  &c.,  produces  accounts 
of  181  cases,  among  which  there  are  those  of  52  persons 
buried  alive,  4  dissected  alive,  53  that  awoke  in  their 
coffins  before  being  buried,  and  72  other  cases  of 
apparent  death.  Hartmann  himself  gives  more  than  a 
hundred  cases.  Tebb  and  Vollum  collected  an  equal 
number,  and  very  many  cases  appear  elsewhere  in  the 
literature  upon  this  subject.  Enough  has  been  said  at 
all  events  to  show  how  extraordinarily  numerous  these 
cases  are ;  and  it  becomes  evident  that  some  steps 
should  be  taken  to  prevent  such  burials  from  taking 
place.  We  hope  that  the  publication  of  this  book  will 
at  all  events  stimulate  public  interest  in  this  direction, 
and  help  to  initiate  some  widespread  movement  for  the 
prevention  of  such  horrible  cases  as  those  described. 


2.  Efforts  to  Prevent  Premature  Burial. 

During  the  past  few  years  the  question  of  the  prevention 
of  premature  burial  has  been  taken  up  by  several  of  the 
State  legislatures,  and  laws  have  been  suggested,  and,  in 
some  cases  enacted,  tending  to  reduce  the  possibility  of  such 
a  catastrophe.  One  of  the  best  examples  of  such  legisla- 
tion is  the  bill  presented  to  the  Massachusetts  Legisla- 
ture. This  provides  that  local  boards  of  health  shall  be 
notified  Avithin  six  hours  of  the  death  of  any  person,  and 
that,  as  soon  as  possible,  an  examination  shall  be  made 
of  the  reported  deceased,  and  that  certifications  of  death 
shall  be  issued  only  after  ten  tests  have  been  made — for 
heart  action,  respiration,  circulation,  rigor  mortis,  &c.,  and 
the  use  of  subcutaneous  injections  of  ammonia. 


PREMATURE  BURIAL  73 

This  subject  of  premature  burial,  now  being  agitated 
in  the  United  States,  was  thoroughly  considered  in 
Europe,  beginning  more  than  a  century  ago.  As  Dr. 
Vollum  has  shown  in  his  article  on  Final  Tests  for 
Death,  France  first  recognised  the  necessity  for  legal  pro- 
tection against  these  dangers.  Germany  was  the  first 
to  put  them  in  force.  Then  followed  France,  Austria, 
Belgium,  Spain,  the  Netherlands,  and  Scandinavia.  The 
pith  of  these  laws  is  in  the  requirement  of  an  expert 
examination  of  the  apparently  dead  independently  of  the 
attending  physician.  In  Germany,  Austria,  and  Belgium 
the  examiners,  called  inspectors  of  the  dead,  are  officers 
of  the  State,  specially  qualified  for  their  duties.  In  the 
other  States  mentioned  they  are  physicians  of  standing, 
also  qualified.  They  must  decide  the  cause  and  fact  of 
death,  and  register  a  certificate  of  verified  death  before 
a  burial  permit  can  be  issued  or  the  body  disturbed 
in  any  way  with  the  view  to  embalming,  autopsy 
burial,  or  cremation.  The  underlying  principle  of  these 
laws  is  well  expressed  in  the  Austrian  imperial  law 
thus : — 

"  That  the  only  sure  sign  of  death  being  general  decomposition, 
which  as  a  rule  comes  late  in  the  case,  the  examiner  of  bodies,  in 
the  absence  of  this  proof,  must  not  be  guided  by  any  single  sign, 
and  must  base  his  conclusions  on  an  assemblage  of  all  signs  that 
point  to  death,  and  to  any  injuries  that  may  involve  the  vital 
apparatus." 

These  laws,  framed  both  in  the  interests  of  the  State 
and  the  individuals,  are  supported  by  the  legal  and  the 
medical  professions,  and  have  always  given  satisfaction 
to  the  authorities  and  comfort  and  a  sense  of  safety  to 
the  people,  excepting  in  France,  where  the  period  allowed 
before  burial  is  only  twenty-four  hours,  and  the  inspec- 
tions are  thought  to  be  rather  perfunctory,  especially  in 


74  DEATH' 

Paris.  The  German  and  Austrian  systems  are  alike,  ex- 
cepting in  the  former  all  bodies  must  go  to  the  waiting 
mortuaries ;  in  the  latter  this  is  voluntary,  as  it  is  in  the 
other  States  named. 

The  German  system  is  best  seen  in  Munich.  This 
city  of  about  50,000  people  is  divided  into  twenty- 
one  burial  districts,  in  each  of  which  there  is  an 
inspector  of  the  dead,  with  an  alternate,  besides  the 
woman  who  makes  the  toilet  of  the  body,  called  leichen- 
frcm,  and  who  arranges  the  funeral  appointments.  She 
is  also  qualified  by  a  technical  examination.  The  attend- 
ing physician  is  always  present  at  the  death  crisis.  He 
gives  his  verdict  of  death,  but  the  laAv  does  not  trust  his 
unsupported  opinion,  however  celebrated  he  may  be.  The 
inspector  comes,  and  in  the  meantime  nothing  about  the 
body  must  be  touched  by  any  one.  He  makes  his 
certificate,  which  covers  every  possible  point  in  the  case, 
and  this  is  countersigned  by  the  attending  physician. 
Delay  and  resuscitation  may  be  employed  at  this  stage 
if  the  inspector  sees  fit.  Ordinarily  he  allows  from  two 
to  twelve  hours'  delay  in  the  residence  for  ceremonies, 
&c.,  when  the  body  must  go  to  the  waiting  mortuary, 
where  it  remains  for  seventy-two  hours  or  longer,  under 
medical  observation,  when  the  mortuary  physician  gives 
his  certificate,  if  all  goes  without  unforeseen  incidents, 
and  the  interment  takes  place  in  the  adjoining- 
cemetery. 

Thus  it  is  seen  that  there  are,  with  the  leichenfrmi, 
four  independent  expert  inspectors.  All  are  on  the 
qui  vive  in  carrying  out  the  system,  which  is  popular  and 
understood  by  all  classes.  The  waitmg  mortuary  consists 
of  a  main  hall,  where  the  bodies  lie  in  open  coffins, 
embowered  by  plants  in  the  midst  of  light,  warmth,  and 
ventilation.  There  is  also  a  laboratory  equipped  with 
apparatus   for    resuscitation,  2^ost'mortem   room,  separate 


PREMATURE  BURIAL  75 

rooms  for  infectious  cases  and  accidents,  a  chapel,  and 
quarters  for  the  physician  and  attendants. 

Count  Michael  von  Karnice  Karnicki,  formerly  cham- 
berlain to  the  Czar  of  Russia,  invented,  in  1898,  an 
exceedingly  clever  apparatus  for  the  prevention  of  pre- 
mature burial.  Being  firmly  convinced  that  thousands 
of  persons  are  buried  every  year  while  in  a  state  of 
lethargy,  he  prepared  a  system  of  signalling,  which  has 
been  adopted  in  one  or  two  instances,  but  only,  so  far  as 
we  know,  in  Europe. 

In  this  invention,  a  tube  protrudes  about  four  feet 
above  the  surface  of  the  grave,  and,  upon  the  top  of  it, 
is  fixed  a  small  metal  box  with  a  spring  lid.  To  the 
lower  end  of  the  tube,  which  just  enters  the  upper  lid  ot 
the  coffin,  is  fixed  an  india-rubber  ball,  charged  so  fully 
with  air  that  the  slightest  extra  pressure  upon  it  would 
result  in  the  discharge  of  this  air  through  the  tube. 
This  would  release  the  lid  of  the  box,  which  is  adjusted 
to  spring  open  at  the  slightest  pressure.  Moreover,  the 
opening  of  this  lid  would  automatically  raise  a  small  fiag, 
and,  at  the  same  time,  would  start  an  electric  bell,  not 
only  over  the  grave,  but  in  the  sexton's  house  as  well. 
Under  this  system,  the  slightest  suggestion  of  breathing 
on  the  part  of  the  supposedly  dead  person,  or  the  smallest 
movement  of  the  body,  would  suffice  to  open  the  box, 
raise  the  flag,  and  sound  an  alarm,  while  the  additional 
mechanism  in  the  tube  would  immediately  begin  to 
pump  air  down  to  the  interior  of  the  coffin,  that  the 
person  who  has  been  buried  by  mistake  might  be  pre- 
served from  suffocation  until  such  time  as  assistance 
might  arrive. 

On  March  1,  1909,  the  House  of  Commons  ordered  to 
be  printed  for  distribution  "  A  Bill  to  Amend  the  Law- 
Relating  to  the  Registration  of  Deaths  and  Burials." 
The    Committee    of   Examination   confessed   themselves 


7G  DEATH 

"  much  impressed  "  by  the  weight  of  the  evidence  brought 
before  them,  tendmg  to  show  that  the  current  medical 
examinations  were  insufficient ;  and  they  ordered  a  more 
thorough  and  complete  examination  and  certification  in 
the  future. 


CHAPTER    V 

BURIAL,  CREMATION,  MUMMIFICATION,   &c. 

Although  burial  is  an  extremely  unhygienic  and  un- 
wholesome custom,  it  is  a  practice  that  is  common  to  all 
Christian  countries.  Originating  in  the  popular  faith  in 
the  doctrine  that  the  body  should  be  preserved  that  it 
might  arise  in  its  entirety  at  the  "  day  of  judgment,"' 
this  idea,  though  now  seldom  advanced  as  an  excuse,  is 
at  the  bottom  of  the  antipathy  that  is  so  frequently 
shown  in  regard  to  cremation.  Of  course,  it  is  needless 
to  say  that,  as  the  process  of  putrefaction  soon  returns 
the  physical  body  to  the  dust  of  the  earth,  through 
which  it  passes  again  into  all  forms  of  vegetable  and 
animal  life,  the  impossibility  of  any  sort  of  bodily 
resurrection,  without  the  performance  of  a  more  stupen- 
dous miracle  than  the  human  mind  could  imagine,  is 
obvious. 

In  fact,  the  only  argument  that  can  be  advanced 
in  favour  of  the  practice  of  burying  the  dead,  as  against 
that  of  cremation,  is  based  upon  the  principle  that  a 
buried  body  may  be  exhumed — after  a  considerable  space 
of  time  has  elapsed,  if  necessary — and  the  effects  of 
poisons,  &c.,  traced — murderers  frequently  having  been 
brought  to  justice  by  this  means  when  they  would  have 
undoubtedly  escaped  punishment  for  their  crimes,  if  the 
most  convincing  evidence  against  them  could  have  been 
destroyed  by  fire.  Such  an  argument  as  this,  however, 
weighs  but  little  as  against  the  many  great  advantages 


78  DEATH 

that  would  be  derived  from  the  practice  of  cremating 
bodies,  for  cremation  is  so  manifestly  the  only  wholesome 
and  hygienic  method  of  disposing  of  the  dead,  that  it 
should  be  legally  adopted  by  all  nations  calling  them- 
selves civilised. 

Incineration,  or  cremation,  was  the  ancient  Roman 
method  of  reducing  the  body  to  ashes,  but  the  ancient 
Jews  early  adopted  the  custom  of  burial.  Thus  Abraham, 
in  his  treaty  for  the  cave  of  Machpelah,  expressed  the 
desire  to  secure  a  suitable  place  in  which  ''  to  bury  his 
dead  out  of  his  sight ; "  and  about  the  only  records  of 
burning  the  dead  that  we  find  in  the  history  of  the 
Jewish  people  are  (1)  the  case  of  Saul  and  his  sons, 
whose  bodies  were  undoubtedly  too  badly  mangled  to  be 
given  the  royal  honours  of  embalmment,  and  (2)  the 
burning  of  those  who  died  of  the  plague,  a  sanitary 
measure  apparently  adopted  to  prevent  further  spread  of 
the  contagion. 

As  all  nations  of  the  ancient  civilisation  held  that  it 
was  not  only  an  act  of  humanity  but  a  sacred  duty  to 
pay  great  honours  to  the  departed,  the  burial  and  fune- 
ral rites  were  frequently  of  a  very  elaborate  character. 
Among  the  Hebrews,  these  began  with  the  solemn  cere- 
mony of  the  last  kiss,  and,  after  the  eyes  had  been  closed, 
the  corpse  was  laid  out  and  perfumed  by  the  nearest 
relative,  and  the  head,  covered  with  a  napkin,  was  sub- 
jected to  complete  ablution  in  warm  water,  a  precaution 
that  was  supposed  to  make  premature  burial  impossible. 

While  the  Jews  frequently  embalmed  the  body  of  the 
dead,  in  no  part  of  the  world  was  this  rite  performed  so 
scientifically  as  in  Egypt.  When  great  personages  like 
Jacob  and  Joseph  died,  the  greatest  care  was  exercised 
in  embalminof  them,  but  there  is  no  means  of  ascertain- 
ing  whether  the  earlier  generations  followed  this  practice, 
or  simply  buried  their  dead  in  caves,  or  in  the  ground. 


BURIAL,  CREMATION,  MUMMIFICATION,  &c.     79 

We  know,  however,  that  the  elaborate  process  followed 
in  later  years  was  finally  abandoned  for  a  simpler  and 
less  effective  method — that  of  merely  swathing  the  corpse 
round  Avith  numerous  folds  of  linen  and  other  stuffs,  and 
anointing  it  with  a  mixture  of  aromatic  substances,  of 
which  aloes  and  myrrh  formed  the  principle  ingredients. 
To  be  sparing  in  the  use  of  spices  on  such  an  occasion 
was  regarded  as  a  most  discreditable  economy,  for  the 
profuse  use  of  very  costly  perfumes  was  regarded  as  the 
highest  tribute  of  esteem  that  could  be  paid  to  the 
departed.  In  view  of  these  facts,  it  is  easy  to  believe  the 
writer  in  the  Talmud  who  tells  us  that  no  less  than 
eighty  pounds  of  spice  were  used  in  burying  Rabbi 
Gamaliel,  and  Josephus  reports  that,  at  the  funeral  of 
Herod,  five  hundred  servants  were  in  attendance  as 
spice-bearers.  From  the  narrative  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment we  see  that  a  similar  custom  was  followed  at  the 
burial  of  Christ. 

The  Jews,  like  most  Oriental  nations,  were  given  to 
the  most  inordinate  exhibitions  of  grief.  From  the 
moment  that  the  vital  spark  was  known  to  have 
departed  from  the  body,  the  members  of  the  family, 
especially  the  women  of  the  household,  burst  forth  into 
the  most  doleful  lamentations,  upon  which  they  were 
joined  by  neighbours  and  relatives,  all  of  whom  crowded 
to  the  house  as  soon  as  they  heard  of  the  bereavement. 
By  the  more  aristocratic  classes  anything  like  outside 
participation  in  the  grief  of  the  family  was  forbidden, 
and,  instead,  this  service  was  performed  by  certain 
women  who  were  known  as  public  or  professional 
mourners.  When  engaged,  they  seated  themselves  in 
the  family  circle,  and,  by  studied  dramatic  effect  and 
eulogistic  dirges,  excited  greater  lamentations  on  the 
part  of  the  immediate  family.  Sometimes  instrumental 
music  was  also  introduced. 


80  DEATH 

As  in  all  Oriental  countries,  burial  among  the  Jews 
occurred  more  quickly  after  death  than  is  generally  the 
practice  in  this  country.  Even  when  the  body  had  been 
carefully  embalmed,  interment  was  not  long  delayed,  and, 
when  this  precaution  had  not  been  taken,  it  was  in- 
variably held  within  less  than  twenty-four  hours.  This 
was  partly  due  to  the  climatic  conditions,  and  partly  to 
the  circumstance  that  the  Jews  taught  that  anybody  who 
came  near  the  death  chamber  was  unclean  for  a  week. 

The  casket,  or  coffin,  is  the  invention  of  the  Egyptians, 
but  the  Jews  and  some  other  races  early  adopted  it. 
Originally  these  chests  of  the  dead  were  composed  of 
many  layers  of  pasteboard  glued  tightly  together ;  later 
they  were  of  wood,  or  stone,  but  for  the  most  eminent 
men  was  reserved  the  honour  of  being  buried  in  coffins 
of  sycamore  wood. 

Although  the  bodies  of  the  dead  were  sometimes 
placed  in  these  caskets  before  being  transferred  to  the 
grave,  the  most  common  method  of  transporting  the 
corpse  from  the  home  of  the  family  to  the  place  of 
interment  was  by  means  of  a  bier,  or  bed,  which  was 
sometimes  composed  of  very  costly  materials.  Instances 
are  known  in  which  kings  and  extremely  wealthy 
personages  have  been  conveyed  to  their  tombs  on  their 
own  beds,  but  the  bier  in  common  use  among  the  poorer 
classes  was  usually  little  more  than  plain  wooden  boards, 
fastened  to  two  long  poles,  and  on  which,  concealed  by 
a  sheet,  or  other  thin  coverlet,  the  body  lay.  It  is  just 
such  a  bier  as  this  that  is  described  in  the  Bible,  and 
they  are  still  used  in  all  Eastern  countries. 

When  the  deceased  was  of  humble  position,  none  but 
the  relatives  and  close  friends  attended  the  obsequies, 
unless  the  family  could  afford  to  employ  the  public 
mourners  and  their  minstrels,  in  which  case  the  latter 
walked  before  and  around  the  bier,  frequently  lifting  the 


BURIAL,  CREMATION,  MUMMIFICATION,  &c.     81 

coverlet  and  exposing  the  corpse,  which  was  always  a 
signal  to  the  company  to  renew  their  shrill  cries  and 
doleful  lamentations.  Thus,  at  the  magnificent  funeral 
of  Jacob,  these  mercenaries  maintained  an  almost  cease- 
less expression  of  the  most  passionate  grief,  and  when 
the  boundary  of  Canaan  appeared — the  site  of  the 
sepulchre — the  entire  company  halted,  and,  for  seven 
days  and  nights  indulged  in  these  violent  exercises  of 
mourning  under  the  leadership  of  the  host  of  professionals 
who  had  been  employed  for  the  occasion. 

Although  sepulchres  have  long  been  in  use  in  Eastern 
countries,  even  the  ancient  races  seldom  made  the  mis- 
take of  erecting  them  in  close  proximity  to  human 
dwellings.  No  matter  how  elaborate  they  may  have 
been — and  from  those  that  are  still  left  it  is  easy  to 
imagine  that  money  was  not  spared  when  some  of  the 
tombs  were  constructed — the  health  regulations  of  the 
time  required  that  they  should  be  built  without  the 
precincts  of  the  city.  Among  the  Jews — as  shown  in 
the  regulations  of  the  Levitical  cities — it  was  specified 
that  the  distance  should  not  be  less  than  2000  cubits 
from  the  city  walls.  Jerusalem  alone  was  excepted,  and 
even  there,  this  privilege  was  reserved  for  the  members 
of  the  royal  family  of  David,  and  some  few  others  of 
exalted  distinction. 

During  the  first  three  centuries  of  the  Christian  era 
this  custom  remained  unchanged.  The  Emperor  Theo- 
dosius  issued  an  edict  expressly  forbidding  the  burial  of 
the  dead  within  any  town,  Avhether  in  churches  or  not, 
and  Chrysostom  not  only  confirmed  this  view,  but  when 
the  Donatists  buried  their  martyrs  in  churches,  they  were 
obliged  to  remove  them.  Even  in  the  fourth  century, 
when  the  building  of  oratories,  or  chapels,  over  the 
remains  of  eminent  Christians — martyrs,  prophets,  &c. — 
began,  the  canon  law  held  this  practice  to  be  unlawful, 

F 


82  DEATH 

and  it  was  not  until  the  sixth  century  that  this  statute 
was  to  any  great  degree  disregarded. 

Thus,  it  will  be  seen  that  while  the  Roman  nation 
continued  to  maintain  the  custom  of  cremation,  the 
Christians  adopted  the  practices  of  the  Jews,  and  buried 
their  dead.  St.  Augustine,  in  several  passages,  com- 
mends this  custom,  not  for  the  reason — as  he  says — that 
we  are  to  infer  that  there  is  any  sense  or  feeling  in  the 
corpse  itself,  but  simply  because  we  are  to  believe  that 
even  the  bodies  of  the  dead  are  under  the  providence  of 
God,  to  whom  such  pious  offices  are  pleasing,  through 
faith  in  the  Resurrection. 


Cremation. 

The  idea  of  having  hundreds  and  thousands  of  decay- 
ing bodies  in  the  immediate  vicinity  of  human  habi- 
tations should  be  so  repellent  to  any  sensible  person, 
that  argument  ought  to  be  unnecessary.  The  only  point 
that  can  be  urged  against  this  practice,  as  we  have 
already  said,  is  that,  in  certain  cases,  it  is  important, 
from  a  medico-legal  point  of  view,  to  have  the  body 
where  it  can  be  exhumed,  if  necessary. 

It  seems  to  us  important  that  we  should  insist  as 
strongly  as  possible  upon  this  point — the  logical  neces- 
sity of  cremating  the  dead.  Rightly  considered,  this 
practice  does  not  in  any  way  conflict  with  Christian 
teaching,  but  conforms  to  its  highest  standards.  After 
death,  we  are  not  concerned  with  the  material  man,  but 
with  the  spiritual  replica  (granting  anything  to  exist  at 
all),  and  no  one  in  these  enlightened  days  would  think 
for  a  moment  that  a  truly  physical  resurrection  of  the 
body  took  place.  It  would  not  be  desirable,  in  the  first 
place,   and  is   an   obvious   impossibility,  in   the  second. 


BURIAL,  CREMATION,  MUMMIFICATION,  &c.      83 

Yet  it  is  only  this  worn-out  and  effete  tradition  of  phy- 
sical resurrection  which  prevents  the  general  adoption  of 
cremation — the  far  more  sanitary  and  rational  process. 
Let  us  consider  some  of  its  benefits  a  little  more 
closely. 

In  the  first  place,  then,  there  is  the  very  evident 
reason  that  there  will  not  be  enough  space,  very  soon,  to 
contain  all  the  bodies  that  are  to  be  consigned  to  the 
earth.  The  population  of  Brooklyn  and  of  New  York 
(to  take  typical  cases)  increased  more  than  seven  times 
in  fifty  years — from  1840  to  1890,  and  the  population 
is  now  more  than  four  million.  And,  as  Mr.  Augustus 
G.  Cobb  well  says  :  ^ — 

"  The  effect,  in  twenty  years,  on  these  six  cemeteries  will  be  to 
increase  by  a  million  additional  bodies  the  1,336,000  already 
received.  Brooklyn  is  twenty-three  times  as  large  to-day  as  it  was 
fifty  years  ago,  when  the  first  interment  was  made  in  Greenwood  ; 
and,  as  a  natural  consequence,  this  cemetery,  once  surburban,  has 
become  intramural.  It  need  surprise  no  one  to  learn  that  its 
exhalations  have  been  complained  of  in  South  Brooklyn,  and,  con- 
sidering the  thousands  annually  interred  within  its  grounds,  and 
the  increasing  density  of  population,  we  can  readily  believe  that 
the  evil,  instead  of  diminishing,  will  increase.  .  .   ." 

It  is  needless  to  point  out  that  such  a  mass  of  decom- 
posing organic  material,  so  close  to  the  very  homes  of 
the  inhabitants,  is  apt  to  prove  extremely  dangerous : 
first,  by  contaminating  the  wells,  springs,  and  water  in 
the  neighbourhood  ;  and  secondly,  by  vitiating  the  atmos- 
phere and  rendering  a  serious  epidemic  not  only  possible 
but  exceedingly  likely.  When  we  know  that  germs  can 
be  carried  through  the  air  for  miles — as  they  can — the 
immediate  peril  of  a  graveyard  need  hardly  be  pointed 
out.     As   Sir   Lyon   Playfair  (after   making  a  most  ex- 

*  Earth  Burial  and  Crcviation,  pp.  26,  27. 


84  DEATH 

haustive  investigation  of  the  whole  question)  expressed 
it:— 

"  In  most  of  our  churchyards  the  dead  are  harming  the  living 
by  destroying  the  soil,  fouling  the  air,  contaminating  water-springs, 
and  spreading  the  seeds  of  disease." 

Says  Mr.  Cobb  : — 

"  Opposition  to  incineration  springs  chiefly  from  ignorance  of 
the  manner  in  which  it  is  effected ;  and  to  remove  all  misappre- 
hension, it  cannot  be  too  distinctly  stated  that  the  body  never  rests 
in  flames,  while  during  the  entire  process  there  is  no  fire,  or  smoke, 
or  noise  to  grieve  in  any  manner  the  bereaved.  The  consuming 
chamber  in  which  the  body  is  placed  is  built  of  fireclay,  and  is 
capable  of  resisting  the  highest  temperature.  Under  it  and  around 
it  the  fire  circulates,  but  it  cannot  enter  in.  The  interior,  smooth, 
almost  polished,  and  white  from  the  surrounding  heat,  presents  an 
aspect  of  absolute,  dazzling  purity ;  and  as  the  body  is  the  only 
solid  matter  introduced,  the  product  is  simply  the  ashes  of  that 
body.  During  the  entire  process  of  incineration  the  body  is 
hidden  from  view.  .  .  .  The  heated  air  soon  changes  it  to  a  trans- 
lucent white,  and  from  this  it  crumbles  into  ashes." 

Is  not  this  picture  far  more  pleasant  than  that  of  the 
grave  ?  Is  it  not  far  more  cleanly,  hygienic,  and  sen- 
sible ?  Is  it  not  obvious  that  cremation  is  simply 
unpopular  for  the  reason  that  it  is  based  on  a  mass  of 
false  sentiment  and  worn-out  theological  dogmas  as  to 
the  resurrection  of  the  body  ?  From  every  rational  point 
of  view,  everything  is  in  favour  of  the  process,  nothing 
against  it. 

We  are  familiar  with  the  so-called  objections  to  crema- 
tion advanced  by  M.  Jean  Finot  in  his  Philosojyhy  of  Loiig 
Life.  We  can  only  say  that  they  appear  to  us,  for  the 
most  part,  as  totally  inadequate.  Some  of  his  facts,  it 
is  true,  are  worthy  of  serious  consideration :  his  negative 
evidence  as  to  the  pollution  of  the  air  in  the  neighbour- 


BURIAL,  CREMATION,  MUMMIFICATION,  &c.     85 

hood  of  cemeteries,  &c.  But  bis  idea  that  the  life  of  the 
body  is  perpetuated  in  the  Hves  of  the  worms  that  devour 
it ! — that  appears  to  us  Httle  short  of  absurd.  In  direct 
opposition  to  this  view  let  us  quote  the  opinion  of 
Mrs.  Annie  Besant,  who,  in  her  Death,  and  After  ?  says  : — 

"  One  of  the  great  advantages  of  cremation,  apart  from  all  sani- 
tary considerations,  lies  in  the  swift  restoration  to  Mother  Nature 
of  the  physical  elements  comprising  the  dense  and  ethereal  corpses 
brought  about  by  the  burning,  and  hence  the  quicker  freedom  of 
the  soul  from  the  body.  On  the  assumption  that  a  soul  of  some 
sort  exists,  this  would  certainly  seem  far  the  more  rational  suppo- 
sition ;  and  if  materialism  be  true,  and  no  soul  persists,  then 
cremation  has  the  field  entirely,  since  there  would  remain  no  valid 
objection  to  the  practice  whatever." 

Embalming. 

Embalming  is  a  method  of  preserving  bodies  by  injec- 
tions and  dressings,  either  internally  or  externally  applied. 

This  term  is  generally  given  to  the  process  employed  by 
the  ancient  Egyptians  and  others,  by  which  corpses  were 
preserved  as  mummies.  The  practice  is  very  ancient, 
and  is  probably  founded  on  religious  rites  and  observ- 
ances. The  Egyptians  believed  that  it  would  be  possible 
for  the  departed  spirit,  at  some  future  time,  to  reanimate 
the  body  of  the  deceased,  and  hence  took  great  pains  to 
preserve  it  as  perfectly  as  possible.  Some  of  the  pro- 
cesses employed  were  very  elaborate  and  expensive,  and 
could  only  be  afforded  by  the  wealthy.  The  most  elabo- 
rate process  was  somewhat  as  follows : — 

A  deep  cut  was  made  beneath  the  ribs  on  the  left 
side,  and  through  the  opening  thus  made  the  internal 
organs  were  removed,  with  the  exception  of  the  heart  and 
kidneys.  The  brain  was  also  extracted  through  the  nose 
by  means  of  a  bent  iron  instrument.  The  cavities  of  the 
skull   and   trunk   were   washed  uut  with   palm-wine,  and 


86  DEATH 

filled  with  raisins,  cassia,  and  similar  substances ;  and 
the  skull  was  dressed  by  injecting  drugs  of  various  kinds 
through  the  nostrils.  The  body  was  then  soaked  in 
natron  for  seventy  days.  It  was  then  removed  and 
wrapped  carefully  in  linen  cloth,  cemented  by  gums. 

The  less  expensive  process  consisted  in  removing  only 
the  brains  and  injecting  the  viscera  with  cedar  oil. 
When  the  body  was  soaked  in  natron  for  the  same  period 
of  time  (seventy  days),  the  viscera  and  soft  parts  came 
away  en  masse,  and  only  the  skin  and  bones  were  left. 

The  very  poor,  who  could  not  afford  either  of  the  above 
methods,  embalmed  their  dead  by  washing  the  body  in 
myrrh  and  salting  it  for  seventy  days.  The  body,  thus 
embalmed,  was  ready  for  the  sepulchre ;  but  it  was  often 
kept  at  home  for  a  considerable  time  afterwards,  and 
was  produced  on  certain  occasions — such  as  a  dinner- 
party ! — and  carried  round  the  room  "  to  remind  the 
diners  that  death  was  ever  with  them." 

Doubtless  the  method  of  embalming  differed  greatly 
in  different  countries  and  in  the  same  country  at  various 
times.  The  above  process  was  described  by  Herodotus 
in  his  writings  as  being  practised  in  Egypt  at  that  time. 
Animals  were  also  embalmed,  especially  those  held  to  be 
sacred.  It  is  certain,  however,  that  only  a  small  per- 
centage of  the  dead  organic  matter  could  have  been 
disposed  of  in  this  manner ;  and  it  is  not  known  what 
became  of  the  remainder  or  disposition  was  made  of  it. 

Embalming  is  carried  on  at  the  present  day,  but  for 
very  different  reasons  and  in  a  different  manner.  The 
object  is  not  to  preserve  the  body  for  centuries,  as  the 
Egyptians  hoped  to  do,  and  in  fact  actually  succeeded  in 
doing.  In  some  countries  the  use  of  salts  of  arsenic, 
corrosive  sublimate,  &c.,  is  prohibited  by  law  for  medico- 
legal reasons ;  but  embalming  can  only  be  performed  by 
toxic  substances.     Many  of  these  have  been  tried,  with 


BURIAL,  CREMATION,  MUMMIFICATION,  &c.     87 

limited  success.  Essential  oils,  alcohol,  cinnabar,  cam- 
phor saltpetre,  pitch,  resin,  gypsum,  tan,  salt,  asphalt, 
Peruvian  bark,  cinnamon,  corrosive  sublimate,  chloride  of 
zinc,  sulphate  of  zinc,  acetate  of  aluminium,  sulphate  of 
aluminium,  creosote,  carbolic  acid,  &c.,  have  all  been 
recommended  by  modern  embalmers.  In  these  days  de- 
tails of  procedure  vary,  but  all  must  conform  to  the  law. 

The  length  of  time  which  a  body  will  keep  before 
decomposition  sets  in  varies  greatly.  In  those  cases  in 
which  but  little  flesh  is  left  on  the  bones,  and  when  the 
blood  has  decreased  greatly  in  volume  (for  example,  in 
consumption,  where  great  emaciation  has  taken  place 
before  death),  the  body  will  keep  far  longer  than  one 
which  has  a  large  amount  of  tissue  still  upon  the  bones 
and  a  large  volume  of  blood.  Blood  being  the  active 
principle  in  decomposition,  its  prompt  removal  is  neces- 
sary in  cases  of  this  character.  The  time  of  year,  the 
disease  from  which  the  person  died,  &c.,  all  have  an 
appreciable  effect  upon  the  length  of  time  the  body  will 
naturally  take  to  decompose ;  and  hence  all  these  factors 
must  be  taken  into  account  by  the  embalmer  in  selecting 
the  amount  and  the  strength  of  the  fluid  to  be  injected 
into  the  arteries  of  the  corpse. 

The  general  procedure  is  somewhat  as  follows : — The 
body  being  laid  out,  an  incision  is  made  with  a  sharp 
knife,  and  the  artery  is  drawn  to  the  surface  by  means 
ot  a  metal  hook.  The  artery  selected  varies,  some  em- 
balmers chosing  the  brachial  artery,  others  the  axillary 
artery,  &c.  It  depends  upon  the  individual  choice  of 
the  embalmer.  If  a  visible  scar  is  objected  to,  the 
brachial  artery  cannot  be  used.  After  the  artery  is 
broucrht  to  the  surface  and  cut,  the  embalminii:  fluid  is 
forced  into  it  by  means  of  a  small  pump  provided  with 
two  valves,  after  the  manner  of  the  heart.  It  is  intended, 
indeed,  to   take   the  place  ot    the   heart  in  forcing   the 


88  DEATH 

blood  through  the  body.  One  of  these  valves  forces  the 
fluid  mto  the  artery ;  the  other  sucks  up  the  fluid  from 
the  bottle  in  which  it  is  contained.  The  fluid  passes 
directly  across  to  the  heart  and  other  vital  organs,  and 
when  this  has  been  done  a  second  incision  is  made  just 
below  the  heart,  which  is  punctured.  The  blood  is  then 
drawn  ofl"  from  the  heart,  and  the  double  process  is  con- 
tinued until  all  the  blood  in  the  body  has  been  replaced 
by  the  embalmer's  fluid.  Sometimes  a  second  artery  is 
cut  in  the  leg.  If  the  fluid  is  found  to  come  away  clear 
at  this  point,  without  an  admixture  of  blood,  the  body  is 
clear  of  blood — the  chief  decomposing  agent. 

The  fluid  which  is  injected  into  the  body  has  a  ten- 
dency to  harden  the  tissues,  and  they  could  be  made 
actually  brittle  if  enough  were  used.  The  embalmer 
uses  his  judgment  as  to  the  strength  of  the  fluid. 
Generally,  an  8 -ounce  bottle  of  prepared  embalming 
fluid  is  mixed  with  half  a  gallon  of  water,  this  being  the 
typical  "  embalmer's  solution." 

From  a  medico-legal  point  of  view,  there  is  much 
that  can  be  said  against  embalming.  Brouardel  has 
pointed  out  that  embalming  can  only  be  performed  with 
toxic  substances,  and  this  fact  would  vitiate  any  sub- 
sequent investigations  that  might  have  to  be  made — in 
a  poison  case,  for  example.  Embalming  might  preserve 
bodies  a  much  greater  length  of  time  than  would  other- 
wise be  the  case  ;  but  what  is  the  object  to  be  gained 
thereby  ?  The  body  must  ultimately  decompose,  whether 
embalmed  or  not,  and  of  what  use  is  the  preservation  of 
bodies  ?  Our  chief  object  should  be,  not  to  preserve 
them,  but  to  get  them  out  of  the  way  as  speedily  and 
as  hygienically  as  possible.  It  is  surely  a  more  pleasing 
thought  to  think  of  a  cremated  body  than  to  dwell  upon 
the  condition  of  one  that  has  been  buried  six  months  or 
a  year. 


BURIAL,  CREMATION,  MUMMIFICATION,  &c.     89 

Mummification. 

The  mummified  bodies  of  some  of  the  Egyptians  have 
doubtless  been  seen  by  every  one.  So  perfectly  have 
some  of  these  bodies  been  preserved  that  even  the  features 
can  be  recognised  after  more  than  three  thousand  years. 
The  bandages  wrapped  round  the  bodies  were  doubtless 
antiseptic  in  character ;  but  the  details  of  their  methods 
have  been  lost. 

Apart  from  such  cases,  mummification  of  bodies  may 
sometimes  take  place  spontaneously,  and  the  body  be 
mummified  mstead  of  decomposing.  This  is  especially 
the  case  in  dry,  hot  countries,  where  there  is  but  little 
moisture  in  the  air.  In  the  sandy  soil  of  Mauritius,  e.g., 
it  is  asserted  that  bodies  frequently  become  mummified. 
Where  there  is  a  lack  of  air,  the  body  will  also  occa- 
sionally assume  this  condition,  even  in  our  climate. 
M.  Audouard  reports  a  case  of  a  mummified  body, 
discovered  by  him,  in  which  "  the  skin  was  like  parch- 
ment, shrivelled,  and  of  a  buff  colour.  When  it  was 
tapped  with  the  back  of  a  knife,  it  resounded  like  card- 
board." The  body  had  become  very  light.  M.  Audouard 
found  also  that  the  skin  was  perforated  with  a  number 
of  holes,  like  a  colander,  and  that  dust  from  within  escaped 
through  these  little  holes  !  A  thigh  of  the  leg  weighed 
just  one-third  of  the  normal  weight.  The  body  had 
been  devoured  by  mites,  which  had  eaten  all  the  tissues  of 
the  woman.  The  dust  within  the  hollow  and  mummified 
limb  consisted  mostly  of  the  excretions  of  the  mites. 

It  is  asserted  that  mummification  of  the  body  of  an 
unborn  child  will  take  place,  if  the  child  be  preserved  in 
utero,  and  no  air  is  allowed  to  enter  the  uterus.  It  is 
sometimes  seen  in  the  young,  more  rarely  in  adults. 

Lately,  when  one  of  us  revisited  the  Eg^-ptian  room 
in  the   British  Museum,   he    noticed    very    carefully    the 


90  DEATH 

physical  peculiarities  ot  some  of  the  excellent  specimens 
of  nmmmification  there  exhibited.  One  case  is  especially 
interesting.  A  hand  and  arm,  stripped  of  the  winding 
bandages,  is  shown — perfect  in  its  texture,  all  the  nails, 
and  even  the  texture  of  the  skin,  being  clearly  visible. 
The  arm  is  shrunk  to  about  one-fourth  its  normal  size  (it 
is  merely  the  skin  stretched  over  the  two  bones  of  the 
fore- arm).  The  hand  is  partly  clenched.  The  whole  is 
jet  black,  and  has  the  appearance  of  being  made  of 
unpohshed  ebony.  The  human,  living  arm  has  now 
become  petrified,  as  it  were,  and  takes  on  the  exact 
appearance  of  wood.  The  arm  is  extremely  hard  and 
brittle — so  much  so,  indeed,  that  it  is  cracked  along  its 
upper  surface — ^just  as  a  piece  of  Avood  might  be  cracked 
or  split.  This  struck  us  at  the  time  as  a  very  remarkable 
phenomenon — apparently  showing  the  ultimate  tendency 
of  such  organic  substances  to  petrify,  become  coal-like 
and  finally  return  to  the  mineral  elements  from  which 
they  sprang. 

M.  Megnin  divides  the  work  of  the  "  labourers  of 
death  "  into  four  periods.  In  the  first,  quaternary  com- 
pounds are  attacked  and  destroyed ;  in  the  second,  fatty 
substances  are  attacked ;  in  the  third,  the  soft  parts  are 
liquefied;  lastly,  in  the  fourth  period,  the  dried-up  mummy 
is  filled  with  mites. 

In  all  cases  (with  the  exception  of  cremation),  a  fer- 
mentation takes  place  before  the  body  is  completely 
destroyed ;  gas  is  produced,  and  the  organism  is  returned 
to  the  mineral  kingdom  more  or  less  rapidly — the  rapidity 
and  character  of  this  return  being  governed  by  several 
considerations.  This  is  the  invariable  process,  except  in 
those  rare  cases  in  which  the  body  remains  frozen,  or  where 
it  is  devoured  by  wild  animals  or  birds  of  prey.  When 
the  body  is  immersed  in  the  ocean,  it  is  soon  devoured 
by  sharks,  crabs,  and  other  carnivorous  sea-creatures. 


BURIAL,  CREMATION,  MUMMIFICATION,  &c.     91 

The  body,  Avhen  lying  in  peaty  soils,  or  when  sur- 
rounded with  other  antiseptic  influences,  will  mummify. 
The  body  must  be  rather  thin  and  juiceless,  however. 
There  is  a  church  at  Toulouse  where  the  structure  of  the 
place  seems  to  cause  mummification  of  bodies,  owing  to 
a  current  of  air  being  always  present. 

The  process  of  preserving  the  body  by  drying,  which 
has  sometimes  prevailed  among  savage  people,  is  prob- 
ably somewhat  similar  to  the  method  of  preserving  meats 
which  is  practised  by  the  natives  of  certain  parts  of  South 
America.  As  described  by  Charles  J.  Post,  the  artist  and 
explorer,  this  is  as  follows  : — 

"The  national  food  of  the  country  is  the  'chalona'  and  the 
*  chuno.'  These  are  consumed  so  generally  that  there  are  many 
villages  east  of  the  Andes  in  which  the  people  have  no  other  means 
of  support  than  that  which  is  afforded  by  the  preparation  of  these 
edibles.  The  '  chalona  '  is  nothing  more  or  less  than  mutton  that 
has  been  dried  so  thoroughly  that  it  bears  a  close  resemblance  to  a 
mummy.  The  natives  take  the  carcase  of  the  sheep  up  into  the 
mountains — sometimes  2000  feet  or  more  above  the  sea-level — and 
there  they  let  it  lie  all  day  beneath  the  rays  of  the  sun.  When  the 
dew  begins  to  fall,  or  there  is  any  apparent  dampness  in  the  atmos- 
phere, they  cover  it  securely,  and  do  not  expose  it  to  the  air  again 
until  these  conditions  have  disappeared.  When  fully  preserved 
under  proper  conditions,  the  carcase  of  the  sheep  will  not  weigh 
more  than  ten  or  twelve  pounds, 

"  The  Indians  eat  this  meat  raw,  masticating  it  to  a  degree  that 
corresponds  to  our  modern  method  of  '■  Fletcherism.'  If  it  is  to 
be  cooked,  however,  it  is  necessary  to  stew  it  for  fully  ten  hours 
the  day  before  it  is  to  be  used,  and  to  boil  it  again  for  not  less 
than  four  hours  the  day  that  it  is  to  be  served.  The  natives  eat 
it  in  combination  with  the  '  chuno ' — potatoes  that  have  been 
treated  in  the  same  fashion  until  they  have  been  dried  to  about 
the  size  of  a  bantam  egg," 

As  Mr.  Post  suggests,  this  is  a  process  of  mummi- 
fication. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE   CAUSES  OF  DEATH 
1.  Sudden  Death. 

In  the  present  chapter  we  propose  to  give  a  brief  r(3sum^ 
of  all  the  causes  of  sudden  death  that  are  known,  taking 
these  descriptions  largely  from  Dr.  Brouardel's  excellent 
work  on  Death  and  Sudden  Death.  Although  this  author 
has  omitted  consideration  of  certain  causes  of  sudden 
death,  his  summary  of  the  facts  is  the  completest  that 
we  have  been  able  to  discover ;  while  his  extensive  experi- 
ence entitles  him  to  a  respectful  hearing  in  whatever  he 
says.  His  own  discussions  of  the  causes  of  sudden  death 
are  very  exhaustive ;  here  we  shall  but  touch  upon  this 
side  of  the  question ;  since  our  chief  interest  is  the  study 
of  natural,  and  not  unnatural,  death — as  all  sudden  deaths 
are.  When  death  results  from  any  disease,  it  is  tolerably 
clear  to  us  what  the  actual  cause  of  the  death  is,  in  that 
case.  We  can  at  all  events  form  a  mental  picture,  in 
rough  outline,  of  what  has  taken  place ;  but  the  same 
is  not  true  in  cases  of  sudden  and  unexpected  death. 
Often  the  cause  is  most  difficult  to  find,  and  it  must  be 
acknowledged  that,  even  here,  much  is  still  uncertain 
and  unknown.  Much  less  is  known  of  the  nature  and 
cause  of  "  natural "  death — as  we  have  seen,  and  shall 
see  further.  Before  we  proceed  to  a  consideration  of 
this  last  and  most  vital  question,  however,  we  must  first 
of  all  consider  sudden  death,  arising  from  various  causes 
— when  such  causes  are  known. 

92 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  93 

In  the  first  place,  then,  it  may  be  said  that  such  a 
thing  as  "  sudden  death  "  does  not,  strictly  speaking,  exist 
at  all !  In  those  cases  where  it  is  supposed  to  have 
taken  place,  it  can  invariably  be  shown  that  some  cause 
or  causes,  acting  for  considerable  periods  of  time  upon  the 
body,  have  produced  these  results.    Says  Dr.  Brouardel: — 

"Why  does  sudden  death  occur?  No  one  dies  suddenly,  apart 
from  the  effects  of  violence,  as  long  as  all  the  organs  are  sound ; 
but  there  are  some  diseases  which  develop  slowly  and  secretly, 
without  the  attention  of  the  patients  having  been  called  to  them  by 
any  pain  or  by  any  feeling  of  illness,  and  -svithout  a  physician  ever 
having  been  called  in,  and  which  terminate  naturally  by  a  rapid 
death.  .  .  .  We  will  define  sudden  death  as  '  the  rapid  and  unfore- 
seen termination  of  an  acute  or  chronic  disease,  which  has  in  most 
cases  developed  in  a  latent  manner.'  .  .  .  However  carefully  we 
may  perform  every  autopsy,  however  minute  our  exploration  of  the 
body  may  be,  however  thorough  may  be  our  knowledge  of  the  causes 
of  death,  we  sometimes  meet  with  cases  which  it  is  impossible  to 
explain.     The  proportion  is  about  8  or  10  per  cent." 

This  is  a  very  significant  admission,  of  which  we  shall 
have  occasion  to  remind  the  reader  at  a  later  stage  of  our 
investigation. 

Turning  now  to  the  causes  of  natural  death,  we  find 
the  first  place  occupied  by  lesions  of  the  heart  and  circu- 
latory system.^     And  we  read  that  "  a  lesion  may  remain 


^  If  an  artery  breaks,  that  is  said  to  be  the  cause  of  the  death  of  the 
individual,  but  few  stop  to  ask,  "  Why  should  the  artery  break  ? "'  Would 
it  not  be  more  accurate,  strictly  speaking,  to  say  that  the  real  cause  of  the 
person's  death  was  that  cause  which  so  weakened  the  wall  of  the  artery 
that  its  rupture  was  possible?  Or,  if  death  takes  place  owing  to  some 
central  inhibition,  would  it  not  be  better  to  seek  the  cause  of  the  inhibi- 
tion rather  than  rest  content  with  the  mere  verdict  of  "heart  failure"? 
To  all  thinking  persons,  the  true  causes  of  death  lie  deeper  than  the  mere 
effect  or  resultant — the  "  last  straw  that  broke  the  camel's  back"  in  very 
truth  !  Strictly  speaking,  the  cause  of  death,  in  such  cases,  is  the  cause  of 
this  last  caiise ;  and,  what  that  is,  ope  of  us  has  tried  to  show  in  another 
place. —  Vitality,  Fasting  and  Nutrition  (pp.  324-31). 


94  DEATH 

latent  during  the  greater  part  of  life,  and  be  only  revealed 
by  accident"  (p.  125).  Lesions  of  the  heart  may  result 
from  a  number  of  causes — (1)  fatty  over-growth  of  the 
heart;  (2)  fatty  degeneration  of  the  muscular  tissue  of 
the  heart;  (3)  fibroid  degeneration  of  the  heart;  (4) 
lesions  of  the  coronary  arteries;  (5)  syphilitic  affections 
of  the  heart ;  (6)  rupture  of  the  heart,  &c.  Then  we 
have  lesions  of  the  pericardium.  Following  this,  as  causes 
of  sudden  death,  we  have  mitral  and  tricuspid  incompet- 
ence, endocarditis,  angina  pectoris,  and  neoplasms  of  the 
heart. 

In  looking  up  the  literature  on  death  we  came  across 
a  rare  manuscript,  viz.,  lectures  on  medical  jurisprud- 
ence given  by  Sir  Douglas  Maclagan  in  1888.  This 
manuscript  is  in  pen  and  ink,  and  is  doubtless  the  only 
one  of  its  kind  in  existence.  Amongst  a  variety  of  inter- 
esting topics,  the  subject  of  death  in  its  various  forms  is 
treated  by  the  author  at  great  length,  and  certain  facts 
are  detailed  in  this  manuscript  that  we  have  not  dis- 
covered in  any  book  printed  and  on  the  market.  There 
are,  however,  certain  statements  contained  in  the  book 
with  which  we  can  by  no  means  agree.  Thus,  our  author 
includes  under  "  natural  death,"  deaths  due  to  haBmor- 
rhage,  diarrhcBa,  wasting  diseases,  deficient  power,  organic 
lesions,  apoplexy,  toxasmia,  epilepsy,  mental  emotion, 
perforation  of  the  viscera,  closure  of  the  glottis,  conges- 
tion of  the  lungs,  effusion  in  the  lungs,  diseases  of  the 
spine,  paralysis,  and  tetanic  spasm.  With  the  single  ex- 
ception of  deficient  power,  we  should  hesitate  to  class  any 
of  the  above  deaths  as  natural.  Deaths  due  to  disease 
are  invariably  WTinatural  and  premature.  It  is  for  this 
reason  that  we  have  not  included  in  this  volume  deaths 
due  to  disease,  murder,  suicide,  and  infanticide.  It  may 
be  well  for  us  to  state  in  this  place  also,  that  we  have 
omitted  all  discussion  of  death   from   the   medico-legal 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  95 

point  of  view,  this  seeming  to  us  out  of  place  in  a  work 
of  this  character. 

We  next  come  to  lesions  of  the  arteries.  Here  we 
find  :  Congenital  lesions,  arterio-sclerosis,  aneurisms,  spon- 
taneous rupture  of  the  aorta.  Of  the  veins :  various 
ruptures,  also  air  in  the  veins.  There  are  also  lesions 
of  the  capillaries,  miliary  aneurisms,  meningeal  hgemor- 
rhages,  capillary  embolisms,  local  disturbances  of  the 
circulation.  Some  of  these,  it  naay  be  said,  can  hardly 
be  classed  as  causes  of  sudden  death,  in  the  orthodox 
sense  of  that  term. 

A  large  number  of  sudden  deaths  are  due  to  lesions  of 
the  cerebro -spinal  system  and  the  major  neuroses.  Here 
we  may  classify  meningitis — tubercular,  chronic,  cerebro- 
spinal, &c.  Abscesses  of  the  brain,  cerebral  tumours, 
lesions  of  the  spinal  cord,  lesions  of  the  nerves,  epilepsy, 
hysteria,  inhibition,  and  sudden  death  from  emotion  or 
mental  causes.  We  shall  have  occasion  to  recur  to  this 
latter  cause  of  death,  when  we  come  to  consider  its  nature 
in  cases  of  "  natural  death." 

There  is,  next,  a  whole  set  of  causes  of  sudden  death 
due  to  lesions  of  the  respiratory  system.  Among  these 
we  find :  lesions  of  the  larynx,  of  the  trachea,  of  the  thy- 
roid body,  of  the  mediastinum,  pulmonary  congestion, 
pneumonia,  capillary  bronchitis,  pulmonary  phthisis,  cancer 
of  the  lung,  emphysema  of  the  lungs,  pleurisy,  rupture  of 
the  diaphragm,  and  compression  of  the  chest. 

Next,  we  have  lesions  of  the  digestive  system.  These 
are : — Lesions  of  the  pharynx,  of  the  a3Sophagus,  of  the 
stomach  (which  might  include  a  number  of  subdivisions), 
lesions  of  the  intestines  (also  subject  to  subdivisions), 
lesions  of  the  liver,  of  the  spleen,  of  the  pancreas,  and  of 
the  suprarenal  capsules.  Among  doubtful  causes  (to  us) 
are  included  corpulency,  climatic  excesses  of  heat,  cold,  &c. 
These  can  hardly  be  called  causes  of  sudden  death  ;  rather, 


96  DEATH 

occasions  of  sudden  death — when  the  organism  is  already 
in  such  a  state  that  life  can  easily  be  terminated  by  a 
very  slight  mal-adjustment  of  external  circumstances. 

In  the  female  there  are  also  special  causes  of  death, 
to  which  the  male  is  not  subject.  Among  these  are : 
vaginal  examination,  extra-uterine  gestation,  recto-uterine 
hematocele,  rupture  of  the  uterus,  vulvo-vaginal  varices, 
syncope  arising  out  of  uterine  conditions,  &c. 

There  are  also  many  cases  of  sudden  death  in  fevers 
and  kindred  states — in  anthrax,  mumps,  diphtheria,  acute 
rheumatism,  typhoid  fever,  plague,  &c.  &c.  A  very  full 
study  of  death  from  some  of  these  conditions  will  be 
found  in  Dr.  John  D.  Malcolm's  Physiology  of  Death  from 
Traumatic  Fever  (London,  1893).  Sudden  death  may  also 
be  due  to  haemophilia. 

Sudden  death  may  take  place  in  various  diseases  which 
cannot  of  themselves  be  said  to  be  the  cause  of  the  death 
— e.g.  in  diabetes,  ursemia,  gout,  dropsy,  as  well  as  in  cases 
of  alcoholism.  In  children,  sudden  death  may  result 
from  syncope,  convulsions,  asphyxia,  pulmonary  conges- 
tion, and  various  intestinal  disorders.  All  of  these  classes 
are  subject  to  various  subdivisions.  They  will  all  be 
found  discussed  in  full  in  Dr.  Brouardel's  book  on  Death 
and  Sudden  Death,  to  which  excellent  manual  we  would 
refer  the  reader  for  further  particulars  regarding  such 
cases. 

Death  jrom  Burns  and  Scalds. — A  great  intensity  of 
heat  is  not  required  to  destroy  vitality  of  the  skin.  The 
danger  to  life  is  much  more  in  proportion  to  the  extent 
of  surface  of  the  body  exposed  to  the  action  of  the  fire 
than  to  its  intensity.  Sometimes  it  may  prove  fatal  by 
setting  up  inflammation  of  the  internal  tissues.  In  the 
case  of  corrosions  with  acids,  the  marks  are  generally  of  a 
dirty  brown  colour. 

Death  hy   Haemorrhage. — The    body  is    blanched.      On 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  97 

dissection,  the  great  venous  trunks  are  flabby  and  empty. 
The  large  regions  internally  are  pale.  We  may  find 
hypostasis  in  the  inferior  parts  of  the  lungs,  even  when 
death  is  caused  by  haemorrhage.  We  may  find  evidence 
of  haemorrhage  in  the  internal  parts,  generally  partly  fluid 
and  partly  clotty.  It  is  often  quite  impossible  to  detect 
from  what  vessel  the  blood  has  come. 

Dr.  Harrison,  writing  years  ago  on  death  from  haemor- 
rhage, said,  in  his  Medical  Aspects  of  Death  : — 

"  Death  may  be  said  to  begin  at  different  parts  of  the  body ; 
and  it  will  be  found  that  the  nature,  symptoms,  and  peculiarities 
of  the  act  of  dying  are  determined  by  the  organ  first  mortally 
attacked.  The  alterations  which  directly  occasion  dissolution 
seem  principally  effective  either  in  the  arrest  of  the  circulation 
or  the  respiration. 

"As  the  heart  is  the  great  mover  in  the  circulation,  we  can 
easily  conceive  that  whatever  brings  it  to  stop  must  be  fatal  to 
life.  Extensive  losses  of  blood  operate  in  this  manner,  and  they 
furnish  us  with  a  good  illustration  of  the  manner  in  which  death 
takes  place.  The  sufferer  becomes  pale  and  faint,  his  lips  white 
and  trembling ;  after  a  while  the  breathing  becomes  distressed, 
and  a  rushing  noise  seems  to  fill  the  ears.  The  pulse  is  soft, 
feeble,  and  wavering ;  the  exhaustion  and  prostration  are  more 
-and  more  alarming.  Soon  a  curious  restlessness  takes  place,  and 
he  tosses  from  side  to  side.  At  length,  the  pulse  becomes  un- 
certain, and  the  blood  is  feebly  thrown  to  the  brain.  The  surface 
assumes  an  icy  coldness;  the  mind  is  yet  untouched,  and  the 
sufferer  knows  himself  to  be  dying ;  in  vain  the  pulse  is  sought  at 
the  wrist — in  vain  efforts  are  made  to  re-excite  warmth — the  body 
is  like  a  living  corpse.  Now,  a  few  convulsive  gaspings  arise,  and 
the  countenance  sets  in  the  stiff  image  of  death.  Such  are  the 
more  striking  phenomena  which  attend  the  fatal  haemorrhages. 

"  The  failure  of  the  vital  powers,  from  the  withdrawal  of  blood, 
may  be  regarded  as  a  sort  of  type  of  this  mode  of  death,  since  the 
various  symptoms  which  have  been  named  arise  from  the  cessation 
of  the  healthy  circulation. 

G 


98  DEATH 

"A  dread  of  the  loss  of  blood  may  almost  be  considered  as  an 
instinctive  feeling ;  at  any  rate,  its  importance  is  early  impressed 
on  the  mind,  and  is  never  forgotten.  In  childhood,  it  is  looked 
at  with  alarm ;  and  the  stoutest  mind  cannot  but  view  with  horror 
those  perilous  gushes  of  blood  which  bring  us  into  the  very  jaws 
of  destruction." 

2.  Mental  Causes  of  Death. 

Disease  and  death  are  more  frequently  the  effect 
of  mental  causes  than  might  be  generally  imagined. 
We  know,  for  example,  that  persons  who  are  im- 
moderately addicted  to  intellectual  pursuits  expose 
themselves  to  affections  of  the  brain,  for  it,  like 
any  other  organ,  enters  its  protest  when  especially 
abused.  They  are  liable  to  headaches  and  a  host  of 
nervous  ailments,  while  inflammation  and  other  organic 
diseases  of  the  brain  will  sometimes  supervene.  As  they 
advance  in  life,  apoplexies  and  palsies  are  apt  to  appear. 
Whenever  there  exists  a  predisposition  to  apoplexy, 
close  mental  application  is  always  attended  with  the 
utmost  danger,  especially  in  the  latter  part  of  life. 
Epilepsy  is  another  disease  of  the  nervous  system  that 
may  be  induced,  or  exaggerated,  by  the  state  of  the 
mind,  and  extreme  mental  dejection,  hypochondria,  and 
even  insanity,  may  sometimes  result  from  these  causes. 
Many  individuals  distinguished  for  their  special  talents 
and  learning  have  been  subject  to  such  unhappy  maladies, 
and  yet  it  is  difficult  to  determine  how  much  of  the 
disease  may  justly  be  ascribed  to  the  abstract  labours  of 
intellect,  and  how  much  to  mental  anxiety,  for  it  is 
known  that  undue  strain  upon  the  emotions — either 
excitement  or  depression — may  be  productive  of  these 
results. 

Thus,  in  the  case  of  Sir  Walter  Scott,  the  extreme 
literary  labours  that  he  performed  do  not  seem  to  have 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  99 

had  any  injurious  effect  upon  his  health,  until  the 
brightness  of  his  fortune  had  become  overcast  by  the 
clouds  of  adversity.  When,  with  his  mental  tasks,  were 
mingled  the  agitating  emotions  of  anxiety,  resulting  in 
irregularity  of  habits,  his  physical  health  began  to  break, 
and  the  fatal  disease  of  the  brain  soon  brought  a  tragic 
ending  to  his  life. 

While  there  may  be  occasions  when  even  the  ordinary 
exertions  of  the  brain  are  attended  with  danger,  their 
effect  upon  the  health  is  usually  comparatively  slight, 
unless  they  are  combined  with  one  or  more  of  the 
numerous  feelings,  pleasurable  and  painful,  which,  ac- 
cording as  they  are  mild  or  intense,  are  known  to  us  as 
affections  or  passions. 

As  Dr.  William  Sweetser  said,  in  his  work.  Mental 
Hygiene: — 

"  The  agency  of  the  passions  in  the  production  of  disease,  especi- 
ally in  the  advanced  stages  of  civilisation,  when  men's  relations  are 
intimate,  and  their  interests  clash,  and  their  nervous  susceptibili- 
ties are  exalted,  can  scarcely  be  adequately  appreciated.  It  is 
doubtless  to  this  more  intense  and  multiplied  action  of  the 
passions,  in  union,  at  times,  with  the  abuse  of  the  intellectual 
powers,  that  we  are  mainly  to  attribute  the  greater  frequency  of 
the  diseases  of  the  heart  and  brain  in  the  cultivated  than  in  the 
rufler  states  of  society.  Few,  probably,  ever  suspect  the  amount 
of  bodily  infirmity  and  disease  resulting  from  moral  causes — how 
often  the  frame  wastes,  and  premature  decay  comes  on,  under  the 
corroding  influence  of  some  painful  passion.  ...  In  delicate  and 
sensitive  constitutions,  the  operation  of  the  painful  jmssions  is 
ever  attended  with  the  utmost  danger ;  and  should  there  exist  a 
predisposition  to  any  particular  form  of  disease,  as  consunii»tion, 
or  insanity,  it  will  generally  be  called  into  action  under  their 
strong  and  continued  influence." 

Modern  investigations  in  psychology  have  demon- 
strated so  conclusively  that  the  closest  sympathy  exists 


100  DEATH 

between  the  mind  and  the  body,  that  the  definition 
describing  passion  as  "  any  emotion  of  the  soul  which 
affects  the  body,  and  is  affected  by  it,"  will  not  be 
subjected  to  very  serious  criticism.  As  to  the  direct 
effects  of  these  passions,  they  appear  especially  m  those 
organs  and  functions  which  have  been  denoted  as 
organic — in  the  lungs,  the  stomach,  the  liver,  the 
kidneys,  the  bowels,  &c.  In  fact,  so  sudden  and  apparent 
is  the  influence  of  the  different  emotions  upon  the  viscera 
of  the  chest  and  abdomen,  that  Bichat,  as  well  as  other 
eminent  physiologists,  was  once  led  to  draw  the  erro- 
neous conclusion  that  these  organs  were  actually  the  seat 
of  those  emotions. 

While  it  is  undoubtedly  true  that  some  passions  act 
most  obviously  upon  the  heart,  others  on  the  respiration, 
and  some  on  the  digestive  organs,  it  has  been  clearly 
proved  that,  so  far  from  being  limited  to  one  particular 
organ,  a  number  of  the  organic  viscera  are  almost  in- 
variably included  within  the  influence  of  a  strong  emo- 
tion. At  the  same  time,  such  a  close  correspondence 
exists  between  the  mental  or  moral  feelings  and  the 
physical  body,  that  the  condition  of  the  former  may 
either  determine  or  be  determined  by  that  of  the  latter. 
For  example,  indigestion  may  sometimes  be  the  cause, 
and  sometimes  the  consequence  of  an  irritable  or  un- 
happy temper.  Sour  stomach  may  either  occasion  or 
result  from  a  sour  disposition.  To  sweeten  one  is  certain 
to  have  a  neutralising  effect  upon  the  other.  It  is,  there- 
fore, obvious  that  an  unhealthy  mental  state  imparts  an 
unhealthy  influence  to  the  bodily  organism,  and,  if  such 
evidence  were  needed,  scores  of  historical  facts  might  be 
cited  to  establish  the  truth  of  this  theory. 

The  pleasurable  passions — love,  hope,  friendship,  pride, 
joy,  &c. —  may,  if  properly  experienced,  produce  an  expan- 
sion of  vital  action,  and  yet  even  these  emotions,  if  felt 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEAl^U  101 

intemperately,  exert  a  very  contrary  effect.  The  expres- 
sion that  "joy  kills"  has  a  basis  in  fact,  for,  as  Haller  says, 
in  his  Psyclwlugy,  "  Excessive  and  sudden  joy  often  kills, 
by  increasing  the  motion  of  the  blood,  and  exciting  a 
true  apoplexy."  It  is  said  that  Pope  Leo  X.  died  from 
the  effect  of  extravagant  joy  at  the  triumph  of  his  party 
against  the  French  ;  and  Dr.  Good,  in  his  Study  of  Medicine, 
cites  the  case  of  a  clergyman  who,  at  a  time  when  his 
income  was  very  limited,  received  the  unexpected  tidings 
that  some  property  had  been  bequeathed  to  him.  "  He 
arrived  in  London  in  great  agitation ;  and,  entering  his 
own  door,  dropped  down  in  a  fit  of  apoplexy,  from  which 
he  never  entirely  recovered." 

If  such  facts  are  true  in  regard  to  the  pleasurable  pas- 
sions, there  is  much  more  danger  of  injurious  results  when 
the  emotions  are  of  a  painful  character.  To  quote  Dr. 
Sweetser  again : — 

"  The  painful  passions  act  immediately  upon  the  nervous  system, 
directly  depressing,  disordering,  expanding,  and  sometimes  even 
annihilating  its  energies.  .  .  .  Although  the  general  effect  of  the 
painful  emotions  is  to  induce  a  contraction  or  concentration,  and 
a  depression  of  the  actions  of  life,  yet,  in  their  exaggerated  forms, 
they  are  sometimes  followed  by  a  transient  excitement,  reaction, 
or  vital  expansion,  when  their  operation,  becoming  more  diffused, 
is  necessarily  weakened  in  relation  to  any  individual  organ. 
Under  such  circumstances,  the  oppression  of  the  heart  and  lungs 
is  in  a  measure  removed,  and  the  circulation  and  respiration  go 
on  with  more  freedom.  Hence  it  is  that  when  anger  and  grief 
explode  .  .  .  their  consequences  are  much  less  to  be  dreaded  than 
when  they  are  deep,  still,  and  speechless,  since  here  their  force  is 
most  concentrated." 

Thus,  in  extreme  paroxysms  of  anger,  the  physical 
phenomena  are  most  apparent.  The  face  becomes  dis- 
torted and  repulsive,  the  eyes  sparkling  with  brutal  fury. 
All  the  vital  actions  are  oppressed,  and  often  are  nearly 


102  DEATH 

overwhelmed.  The  blood  retreats  from  the  surface ; 
tremors  and  agitations  appear  in  the  limbs,  or  perhaps 
in  the  entire  body,  and  there  is  frequently  indication  of 
excessive  nervous  affections,  sometimes  giving  place  to 
sobbing  and  hysteria,  and  sometimes  to  convulsions  and 
spasms.  The  action  of  the  heart  is  also  affected,  becom- 
ing feeble,  laboured,  irregular,  and  even  painful.  The 
effect  upon  the  respiration  is  shown  in  the  short,  rapid, 
and  difficult  breathing,  which  produces  a  feeling  of 
suffocation,  a  tightness  that  is  felt  in  the  whole  chest, 
and  that  occasionally  extends  to  the  throat,  choking, 
and  otherwise  interfering  with  the  power  of  speech.  If 
not  noticed  at  the  moment  of  anger,  the  influence  of 
this  passion  almost  invariably  proceeds  to  the  abdomen, 
as  indicated  by  the  subsequent  distress  appearing  in  the 
region  of  the  stomach,  this  being  due  to  the  disturbance 
of  the  stomach,  liver,  and  bowels. 

Almost  innumerable  instances  are  known  in  which 
fainting  has  resulted  from  violent  anger,  and  in  many 
cases  life  itself  has  paid  the  price  of  this  paroxysm  of 
the  emotions.  According  to  John  Hunter,  the  eminent 
physiologist,  death  from  anger  is  as  absolute  as  that 
caused  by  lightning.  In  such  cases,  the  muscles  remain 
flaccid  and  the  blood  dissolves  in  its  vessels.  As  a 
result  the  body  passes  rapidly  into  putrefaction. 

Dr.  Hunter  himself  is  one  of  the  historical  victims  of 
anger.  Though  a  man  of  extraordinary  genius — as  all 
medical  men  know — he  was  subject  to  violent  passions 
which  he  was  never  able  to  control.  When  engaged  one 
day  in  an  unpleasant  altercation  with  his  colleagues, 
some  of  whom  had  peremptorily  contradicted  him,  he 
became  too  angry  to  continue  speaking,  and,  hurrying 
into  an  adjoining  room,  instantly  fell  dead.  The  direct 
cause  of  his  death  was,  of  course,  the  affection  of  the 
heart  from  which  he  had  long  been  a  sufferer,  but  there 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  103 

can  be  no  question  but  that  the  final  stroke  was  super- 
induced by  anger. 

Tourtelle,  the  French  physician,  asserted  that  he  had 
"  seen  two  women  perish — one  in  convulsions  at  the 
end  of  six  hours,  and  the  other  suffocated  in  two  days 
— from  giving  themselves  up  to  transports  of  fury." 

Anger  destroys  the  appetite  and  interferes  with  the 
functions  of  digestion,  and  Dr.  Beaumont,  who  was  once 
able  to  look  into  the  human  stomach  through  the 
opening  caused  by  a  fistula,  discovered  that  anger  or 
other  severe  mental  emotion,  "  would  sometimes  cause 
its  inner,  or  mucous,  coat  to  become  morbidly  red,  dry, 
and  irritable,  occasioning  at  the  same  time  a  temporary 
fit  of  indigestion." 

The  unpleasant  dryness  of  the  throat  caused  by  anger 
— a  condition  which  occasions  the  frequent  swallowing 
action  of  the  muscles — is  due  to  the  inspissation  of  the 
saliva ;  and  some  authorities  have  even  gone  so  far  as 
to  assert  that  such  an  exhibition  of  emotion  may  cause 
the  fluid  of  the  mouth  to  acquire  poisonous  qualities 
"  capable  of  provoking  convulsions,  and  even  madness, 
in  those  bitten  by  a  person  so  agitated."  ^ 

It  is  well  known  that  haemorrhages  from  various  parts 
of  the  body — the  nose,  lungs,  and  stomach — as  well  as 
inflammations  of  difterent  organs,  may  be  produced  by 
severe  attacks  of  anger;  and  Dr.  Sweetser  asserts  that 
he  himself  has  "now  and  then  met  with  instances  of 
erysipelatous  inflammation  about  the  face  and  neck, 
induced  by  paroxysms  of  passion." 

Irritability  and  moroseness  of  temper,  when  long 
continued,  may  also  cause  inflammatory  and  nervous 
disorders,  and  it  is  well  known  to  physicians  and 
surgeons  that  the  fretful  and  fractious  patient  recovers 
less  promptly,  and  is  more  exposed  to  relapses,  than  he 

^  Broussais'  Psycholoyy. 


104  DEATH 

who  is  possessed  with  a  quiet  resignation  to  existing 
conditions.  Wounds  that  have  healed  have  even  been 
known  to  break  out  afresh  as  the  effect  of  unfavourable 
mental  conditions. 

Fear,  like  anger,  has  its  degrees ;  and  its  effect  upon 
the  health  depends  upon  its  intensity.  When  extreme, 
however,  the  results  are  often  astonishing.  Thus,  in 
acute  fear,  the  respiration  becomes  immediately  and 
most  strikingly  affected.  At  the  first  impulse,  a  sudden 
inspiration  occurs,  OAving  to  a  spasmodic  contraction  of 
the  diaphragm,  and  this  is  immediately  followed  by 
an  incomplete  respiration,  cut  short  apparently  by  an 
internal  spasm — either  of  the  throat,  windpipe,  or  lungs. 
The  effect  upon  the  respiration  is  to  make  the  breath 
short,  rapid,  and  tremulous.  The  voice  trembles,  and, 
because  of  the  diminution  of  secretions  of  the  mouth 
and  throat,  becomes  thick  and  unnatural.  At  times, 
even  speechlessness  may  follow. 

Naturally  the  heart  suffers  from  the  effect  of  such 
an  acute  sensation.  Being  oppressed,  or  constricted,  it 
flutters  or  palpitates,  and  in  other  respects  is  visibly 
agitated.  Consequently,  the  pulse  also  becomes  irregular. 
The  viscera  of  the  abdomen  experience  disagreeable 
effects  from  the  sensation  of  fear,  and  these  frequently 
show  themselves  in  spasmodic  contractions,  or  in  a 
morbid  increase  of  secretions.  Occasionally  vomiting, 
but  more  frequently  a  somewhat  involuntary  diarrhoea, 
occurs.  The  urine  also,  though  increased  in  quantity, 
becomes  pale  and  limpid,  and  there  is  an  urgent  if  not 
absolutely  irresistible  desire  to  void  it  frequently.  These 
latter  symptoms,  it  may  be  added,  are  frequently  shown 
in  other  forms  of  serious  attack  upon  the  nerve  force. 

In  time  of  fear,  the  blood  leaves  the  surface  so 
perceptibly  that  the  face  becomes  pallid,  while  the 
skin,   sometimes  in  all   parts   of    the   body,   grows   cold 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  105 

and  rough,  or,  as  we  commonly  say,  like  "  goose-ficsh." 
Frequently  this  apparent  chill  breaks  forth  in  a  cold 
sweat  on  the  forehead,  and  often  in  other  parts  of  the 
body  as  well.  Even  the  hair  of  the  head  may  become 
elevated,  and  the  general  tremor  or  shuddering,  that 
attacks  the  limbs,  proceeds  to  the  teeth,  producing  a 
chattering  sound  very  similar  to  that  which  is  exhibited 
under  conditions  of  extreme  cold,  or  in  a  paroxysm  of 
fever.  As  in  the  case  of  anger,  fear  may  induce  most 
painful  and  unnatural  contortions  of  the  countenance, 
with  convulsive  sobbing  and,  in  the  case  of  women 
especially,  tears;  or,  under  extremely  violent  emotions, 
hysteria.  Even  in  men,  how^ever,  the  depressing  effects 
of  fear  sometimes  include  the  entire  chest  and  upper 
part  of  the  abdomen  within  their  field  of  influence, 
and  if  the  sense  of  constriction  becomes  too  agonising, 
syncope  and  sometimes  death  itself  may  follow.  Just 
as  a  sudden  though  brief  attack  of  anger  may  arrest 
digestion  and  disarrange  the  entire  nervous  organism 
for  a  whole  day,  so  fear  exerts  a  most  dangerous  effect 
upon  the  nerves  and  muscles,  sometimes  even  acting  as 
a  sudden  cathartic. 

If  the  expression,  "  frightened  to  death,"  is  no  idle 
jest  therefore — and  there  is  no  lack  of  examples  to 
prove  that  hundreds  of  persons  have  been  literally 
frightened  out  of  existence — this  fear,  when  severe,  but 
less  pronounced,  may  exert  a  distinctly  contrary  effect. 
Thus,  while  convulsions,  epilepsies,  and  even  insanity, 
have  resulted  from  this  emotion,  these,  as  well  as  many 
other  affections,  have  been  immediately  suspended  or 
entirely  removed,  by  a  strong  expression  of  this  feeling. 
It  sometimes  surprises  us  to  note  how  quickly  a  toothache 
stops  when  we  enter  the  dentist's  rooms,  but  we  seldom 
analyse  the  mental  process  carefully  enough  to  deter- 
mine that  it  is  the  fear  of  the  greater  pain  of  extraction 


106  DEATH 

that  makes  the  minor  nervous  affection  less.  What  is 
true  in  regard  to  the  toothache  also  applies  to  many 
other  ills,  including  sea-sickness,  hypochondria,  &c. 

The  horror  which  we  feel  in  the  presence  of  insects, 
reptiles,  and  other  creatures  known  to  be  entirely  harm- 
less, is  but  another  form  of  fear,  and  its  effect  upon  the 
physical  organism  is  almost  as  distinctly  pronounced. 
Thus,  there  is  the  same  sudden  paleness  and  coldness ; 
the  contraction  of  the  skin  and  elevation  of  the  hair ; 
the  chills  and  rigors  of  the  body ;  the  panting  and 
oppression  of  heiirt  and  lungs.  When  greatly  aggra- 
vated, the  conditions  of  deadly  fear — the  convulsions, 
epilepsy,  and  even  instant  death — are  realised.  Thus, 
Broussais  refers  to  the  case  of  a  woman  who,  on  feeling 
a  living  frog  that  had  been  dropped  into  the  bosom  of 
her  dress,  was  seized  with  profuse  bleeding  from  the 
lungs,  and  survived  but  a  few  minutes. 

Such  antipathies  may  be  innate,  like  the  terror  that 
so  many  individuals  feel  at  the  sight  of  mice ;  and  yet 
grown  persons  as  well  as  children  have  been  thrown 
into  convulsions,  and  have  even  derived  serious  nervous 
injury,  by  being  subjected  to  the  immediate  influence  of 
objects  that  have  been  a  source  of  repugnance  or  horror 
to  them. 

Grief,  whatever  its  cause,  is  essentially  a  mental  pain ; 
and  it  is  inevitably  productive  of  physical  phenomena. 
In  its  simplest  forms,  or  when  produced  by  the  loss  of 
kindred,  friends,  property,  or  other  things  that  are 
generally  deemed  desirable,  it  is  usually  subdued  by  the 
healing  balm  of  time ;  but  when,  as  often  happens,  it  is 
complicated  with  some  one  of  the  malignant  emotions 
of  the  heart — hatred,  revenge,  envy,  jealousy,  &c. — the 
mental  pain  is  accentuated,  and  the  deleterious  effect  is 
increased.  As  we  cannot  escape  this  suffering  when  we 
give   way    to   the   sentiments   of   envy   or    revenge,    we 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  107 

punish  ourselves  by  our  hatred  far  more  than  we  injure 
the  object  of  these  vicious  feeUngs. 

When  grief  is  acute,  it  is  usually  transient  in  char- 
acter. When  it  becomes  chronic,  it  develops  into  melan- 
cholia. In  its  acute  stage  its  symptoms  somewhat 
resemble  those  of  anger,  for  all  passions  founded  on  pain 
are  closely  related  as  to  their  eftect  upon  the  bodily 
functions.  For  example,  there  is  the  same  agonising 
feeling  of  impending  suffocation ;  the  sense  of  oppression 
and  stricture  at  the  heart  and  luniks.  The  entire  chest 
feels  as  though  tightly  bound,  and  the  demand  for  au- 
to alleviate  this  oppression  is  indicated  by  the  long-drawn 
or  protracted  inspirations.  The  greatest  distress,  how- 
ever, is  experienced  in  the  heart,  and,  in  moments  of 
thrilling  distress,  this  heart- agony  becomes  so  great,  that 
it  is  not  uncommon  for  its  victims  to  die — broken- 
hearted. 

As  in  cases  of  anger,  or  fear,  the  influence  of  the 
emotion  of  grief  also  extends  to  the  throat  and  mouth ; 
it  affects  the  circulation,  weakening  the  pulse  perceptibly, 
and,  finally,  proceeds  to  the  organs  of  the  abdomen,  being 
experienced  especially  in  the  pit  of  the  stomach.  The 
appetite  fails ;  the  powers  of  digestion  are  impaired,  or 
suspended,  and  the  throat  becomes  so  contracted  that 
it  is  impossible  for  the  victim  to  swallow  food  without 
frequent  draughts  of  liquor  to  "  wash  down "  every 
mouthful. 

Those  exhibitions  of  bodily  anguish  known  as  "  sob- 
bing," or  "  crying,"  represent  one  of  the  greatest  safeguards 
in  moments  of  grief.  Thus,  death  from  grief  is  said  to 
be  unknown  in  cases  where  the  sorrow  has  been  attended 
by  copious  weeping,  for  the  tears  relieve  the  oppression 
of  the  head  and  lungs,  forming  a  sort  of  natural  crisis 
to  the  paroxysm,  just  as  sweating  is  the  crisis  to  the 
paroxysm  of  fever. 


108  DEATH 

Insanity  and  monomania,  as  well  as  many  other  nervous 
affections,  not  uncommonly  follow  in  the  wake  of  grief, 
just  as  they  attend  upon  the  emotions  that  we  may  term 
anxiety.  In  other  words,  worry  also  kills  through  its 
continued  depressing  effect  upon  the  heart  and  other 
vital  functions.  Palsy,  chronic  inflammation,  dyspepsia, 
are  some  of  the  various  ills  that  may  be  induced  by  the 
protracted  operation  of  the  sentiments  known  as  sorrow, 
anxiety,  or  worry,  and  from  any  of  these  disorders  man 
may  die. 

As  in  fear,  the  depressing  effect  of  sorrow  or  worry 
interferes  with  the  restorative  processes  of  nature.  As 
Dr.   Sweetser  says : — 

'*  When  sorrow  becomes  settled  and  obstinate  the  whole  economy 
experiences  its  baneful  effects.  Thus,  the  circulation  languishes, 
nutrition  becomes  imperfect,  perspiration  is  lessened,  and  the 
animal  temperature  is  sustained  with  difficulty ;  the  extremities 
being  in  a  special  manner  liable  to  suffer  from  cold.  The  skin 
grows  pale  and  contracted,  the  eye  loses  its  wonted  animation, 
deep  lines — indicative  of  the  distress  within — mark  the  coun- 
tenance, and  the  hair  soon  begins  to  whiten  or  fall  out.  The 
effect  of  the  painful  passions  in  depriving  the  hairs  of  their  colour- 
ing matter,  is  many  times  most  astonishing.  Bichat  states  that 
he  has  known  five  or  six  instances  where,  under  the  oppression 
of  grief,  the  hair  has  lost  its  colour  in  less  than  eight  days.  And 
he  further  adds  that  the  hair  of  a  person  of  his  acquaintance  became 
almost  entirely  white  in  the  course  of  a  single  night,  upon  the 
receipt  of  melancholy  intelligence.  .  .  .  The  nervous  system,  sub- 
jected to  the  depressing  influences  to  which  I  have  referred  (in- 
cluding the  accompanying  affliction  of  lost  sleep),  soon  becomes 
shattered,  and,  in  the  end,  all  the  energies,  both  of  mind  and 
body,  sink  under  the  afflictive  burden." 

Although  seldom  so  dangerous  in  its  effects,  the  sense 
of  humiliation  or  shame  is  scarcely  less  pronounced  in 
its  physical  phenomena.     While  not  frequently  a  source 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  109 

of  ill-health,  being  too  transient  an  emotion  to  disturb 
the  bodily  functions  so  seriously,  under  its  severe  action 
headaches,  indigestions,  and  other  nervous  agitations 
occur,  and  even  insanity  and  death  have  succeeded  as  the 
result  of  greatly  aggravated  conditions.  The  records  of 
insane  asylums  show  that  injured  self-love,  which  is  one 
form  that  shame  assumes,  has  been  the  cause  of  many 
mental  derangements,  while  murder  and  other  crimes  may 
readily  be  traced  to  such  emotions.  When  the  feelings  of 
humiliation  are  exceptionally  extreme,  the  mind  suffers  ter- 
rible anguish,  and,  of  necessity,  the  physical  health  becomes 
seriously  endangered.  It  is  under  such  a  mental  strain 
that  the  crime  of  suicide  is  sometimes  committed,  but 
even  when  the  victim  does  not  deliberately  take  his  own 
life  to  escape  the  necessity  of  facing  the  caustic  comments 
of  the  world  under  such  painful  vicissitudes,  the  very 
shame  itself  may  be  productive  of  bodily  derangements 
that  will  make  death  certain. 


3.  Death  by  Poisoning. 

It  is  customary  to  classify  poisons  as  irritant,  corrosive, 
or  neurotic,  according  to  their  effect  upon  the  system. 
At  the  same  time,  certain  poisons  are  so  complicated  in 
their  action  upon  the  human  organism,  that  one  seems 
to  present  the  characteristics  of  another.  Thus  there 
are  some  irritant  poisons  that  exert  a  corrosive  effect, 
although  many  do  not,  and,  under  certain  conditions, 
every  corrosive  poison  may  act  as  an  irritant. 

Most  irritant  poisons  belong  to  the  mineral  kingdom 
— being  both  metallic  and  non-metallic — although  the 
vegetable  kingdom  supplies  a  few,  while  some  of  the  gases 
also  come  within  the  province  of  irritants.  Neurotic 
poisons,  according  to  Taylor,  "  act  upon  the  nervous 
system.     Either  immediately,   or    some   time   after,   the 


110  DEATH 

poison  has  been  swallowed,  the  patient  suffers  from  head- 
ache, giddiness,  numbness,  paralysis,  stupor,  and,  in  some 
instances,  convulsions."  "  But,"  as  Griffiths  says  {Police 
and  Crime,  Yo\.  ii.  159-60): — 

"  The  symptoms  of  all  kinds  of  poisons  intermingle,  and  the 
irritants  may  produce  the  same  as  the  neurotics,  and  some — those 
especially  which  are  derived  from  the  vegetable  kingdom — have 
a  compound  action.  But  one  and  all  are  defined  in  legal  medicine 
as  substances  which,  when  absorbed  into  the  blood,  are  capable 
of  seriously  affecting  health  or  of  destroying  life." 

To  again  quote  the  same  authority : — 

"First  among  the  irritants  we  may  take  sulphuric  acid,  or  oil 
of  vitriol,  a  poison  often  used  in  suicide,  and  in  the  form  of  vitriol- 
throwing  to  do  injury  without  actually  causing  death.  Nitric  acid 
is  the  aqua  fortis  of  the  Middle  Ages,  often  mentioned  in  the  annals 
of  poisoning.  With  nitric  acid  may  be  classed  hydrochloric  or 
muriatic  acid,  which  was  given  by  a  servant  at  Taunton  to  her 
mistress  in  beer.  Oxalic  acid  is  a  vegetable  acid,  generally  very 
rapid  in  its  action,  and  leaving,  as  a  rule,  little  trace.  Tartaric 
acid  and  acetic  acid,  although  irritants  in  large  quantities,  are 
not  commonly  classed  with  poisons." 

Cases  of  poisoning  by  phosphorus,  an  irritant  poison, 
have  been  known  for  long  in  England,  but  are  more 
common  in  France,  the  substance  having  generally  been 
obtained  from  the  tips  of  common  lucifer  matches.  A 
girl  at  Norwich  put  some  compound  of  phosphorus  used 
for  vermin-killing  into  the  family  teapot  with  murderous 
intent,  but  when  hot  water  was  poured  upon  the  leaves 
the  smell  betrayed  the  poison.  A  woman  put  some  phos- 
phorus into  soup  she  gave  her  husband,  who  began  to 
eat  it  in  the  dark,  when  the  luminosity  of  the  liquid 
showed  something  was  wrong. 

Arsenic  is  the  best  known  of  the  metallic   irritants. 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  111 

There  are  so  many  preparations  of  it,  that  it  is  easily 
obtained;  it  is  not  difficult  to  give,  for  it  imparts  no 
particular  flavour  to  food.  The  symptoms  vary;  they 
are  shown  within  eight  hours,  and  sometimes  not  for  five 
or  six  days.  This  poison  may  be  administered  in  small 
quantities,  and  spread  over  some  length  of  time,  so  as 
to  constitute  chronic  poisoning. 

Arsenic  is  sometimes  called  "  the  fool's  poison,"  be- 
cause it  so  generally  betrays  its  presence  in  the  human 
body,  even  after  long  periods  have  elapsed.  The 
body  of  Alice  Hewitt — poisoned  by  her  daughter — was 
exhumed  after  eleven  weeks,  and  154  grains  of  solid 
arsenic  were  found  in  her  intestines  alone.  Other  still 
more  remarkable  cases  are  recorded  —  one  in  which 
the  poison  was  found  in  children  after  eight  years' 
burial ;  a  second  case  is  quoted  where  twelve  years  had 
elapsed,  and  a  third  fourteen  years.  Arsenic  has  also 
the  inconvenient  action  (from  the  murderer's  point  of 
view)  of  preserving  the  body  and  resisting  decomposition. 
This  has  been  exhibited  for  months,  nay,  years,  after 
interment.  It  was  seen  to  a  marvellous  degree  in  the  case 
of  Pel's  Avife,  and  in  the  Guestling  poisoning.  And  yet 
again  in  St.  Celens  (France),  where  ten  bodies  were 
exhumed  and  found  well  preserved.  Zinc  chloride  is 
another  powerful  preservative ;  it  retards  putrefaction 
by  combining  with  the  tissues.  Palmer's  wife  was 
exhumed  after  twelve  months'  burial,  and  all  organs 
had  been  preserved  by  the  antimony  with  which  she 
had  been  poisoned.  Chloride  of  lime  had  the  same 
effect  in  the  case  of  Harriet  Lane.^ 

The  facility  with  which  arsenic  or  some  of  its  com- 
pounds can  be  purchased  has  no  doubt  multiplied  its 
felonious  use  :  this,  and  the  plausible  excuse  so  generally 
put  forward  when  buying  it,  that  it  is  to  kill  rats  and 

^  For  details  of  quoted  cases  see  Griffiths,  Police  and  CriuK^  1891>. 


112  DEATH 

other  vermin — an  excuse  as  old  as  Chaucer.  Lady 
Fowlis,  when  indicted  for  witchcraft  and  poisoning  in 
1590,  was  accused  of  giving  "eight  shilUngs  money  to 
a  person  for  buying  rateoun  poison." 

Tartar  emetic  is  a  substance  with  an  evil  reputation 
in  the  chronicles  of  poisoning.  Two  famous  cases  are 
on  record,  although  both  are  mysteries  to  this  day — 
surrounded  with  such  strong  doubts  that  they  should, 
perhaps,  be  removed  from  the  records  of  crime. 

Dr.  Smith  Ely  Jelliffe,  writing  in  the  Encydopcedia 
Americana,  admits  that  a  strictly  scientific  definition  of 
the  word  "  poison  "  cannot  be  given. 

"  In  general  it  is  said,"  lie  adds,  "  that  a  poison  is  any  sub- 
stance which  brings  about  a  change  in  the  molecular  composition 
of  an  organ,  or  organs,  causing  its  functions  to  depart  very  dis- 
tinctly from  the  normal.  But  what  grade  of  molecular  disturbance 
is  necessary  to  make  a  substance  a  poison,  and  how  far  from  the 
normal  must  be  the  functional  alteration,  it  is  impossible  to 
say. 

"It  is  believed  that  for  practically  all  forms  of  poison  a  distinct 
alteration  in  the  character  of  the  cells  of  the  body  takes  place,  as 
well  as  a  change  in  the  chemical  composition  of  the  poisonous 
substance.  ...  It  is  rarely  that  the  reaction  between  the  body- 
cell  and  the  poison  is  purely  of  a  physical  nature,  yet  this  very 
frequently  happens  in  many  poisons  that  act  on  the  blood.  By 
some  of  the  poisons — the  anilines,  for  example — the  blood  under- 
goes changes,  not  so  much  due  to  new  chemical  compounds  formed 
as  in  the  physical  changes  in  the  tension  of  the  blood  serum  and 
the  blood  corpuscles,  whereby  the  blood-colouring  matters  stream 
out  into  the  plasma,  and  the  oxygen-carrying  function  of  the  blood 
is  lost.  Similar  types  of  poisoning  result  from  some  of  the  metals, 
and  the  poison  of  the  cholera  organism  is  thought  to  act  in  a  like 
manner.  In  other  poisons  there  is  a  direct  union  of  the  ions  of 
the  poison  with  some  constituents  in  the  cells  of  the  body,  making 
new  chemical  compounds,  and  thus  interfering  with  the  molecular 
activities  of  the  cells." 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  113 

The  following  is  a  summary  of  some  of  the  most 
common  types  of  poisoning  : — 

Poisoning  by  the  mineral  acids — nitric,  sulphuric, 
hydrochloric — is  not  uncommon.  In  these  there  is  a 
marked  caustic  action,  with  intense  burning  pain  when 
taken  by  the  mouth.  The  lips  are  stained  yellow,  black, 
or  white  respectively,  according  to  the  poison  taken. 
There  is  nausea,  vomiting,  and  diarrhoea,  with  all  the 
symptoms  of  an  intense  gastro-enteritis,  with  collapse, 
pale  face,  cold  sweating  extremities,  small,  feeble  pulse, 
rapid  respiration ;  and  the  patient  dies  in  intense 
agony. 

Poisoning  by  alkalies  is  infrequent.  Occasionally 
sodium  hydrate,  or  potassium  hydrate,  is  swallowed. 
Lime  is  also  taken  by  accident ;  so  (rarely)  is  ammonia. 
The  symptoms  are  much  like  those  of  poisoning  by  the 
mineral  acids,  except  that  there  are  no  marked  dis- 
colorations.  The  halogen  compounds  are  very  markedly 
poisonous  as  gases,  notably  chlorine,  bromine,  fluorine ; 
and  the  iodides  and  bromides  cause  forms  of  chronic 
poisoning. 

The  heavy  metals  as  such  are  not  poisonous,  but  their 
soluble  compounds  are  all  poisonous.  They  vary  widely, 
however,  in  strength.  In  order,  from  the  strongest  to 
the  weakest,  they  are  caustic  or  astringent.  In  all  the 
symptoms  are  analogous ;  there  is  severe  gastro-enteritis, 
with  symptoms  of  collapse.  According  to  the  solubility 
or  insolubility  of  the  poison,  the  burning  is  more  or 
less  deep. 

Arsenic  and  phosphorus  are  poisons  that  give  very 
similar  symptoms :  acute  gastro-enteritis,  with  nausea, 
vomiting,  purging;  then  some  grade  of  apparent  re- 
covery, to  be  followed  after  a  few  days  with  a  recrudes- 
cence of  the  gastro-enteritis  and  the  development  of 
secondary  blood-vessel  changes,  which  may  cause  minute 

H 


114  DEATH 

haemorrhages  in  any  part  of  the  body.     Then  follow  fatty 
degeneration  and  death. 

Practically  all  of  the  amesthetics  and  hypnotics  belong 
to  the  alcohol  group,  and  produce  allied  symptoms. 

Phenols  form  a  distinct  group,  in  which  carbolic  acid 
may  be  taken  as  a  type.  This  causes  gastro-enteritis, 
with  severe  pain,  white  scar  of  lips  and  throat,  buzzing, 
dizziness,  smoky  to  blackish  urine,  pale,  bluish  face, 
weak  heart,  quick  breathing,  coma,  and  sometimes 
convulsions. 

Another  large  group  of  poisons,  the  anihnes,  include 
many  of  the  more  modern  drugs,  such  as  acetanilid. 
Closely  alUed  are  different  aniline  dyes ;  also  phenacetin, 
antipyrin,  &c.  In  these  the  characteristic  signs  of 
poisoning  are  somewhat  similar  to  those  seen  in  the 
phenol  group,  but  in  the  more  pronounced  ones  of  this 
series  the  main  changes  occur  in  the  blood.  There  is 
blueness  of  the  skin  and  lips,  difficulty  in  breathing, 
sometimes  pinkish  to  purplish  urine,  rapid  and  feeble 
heart  action. 

Alkaloidal  poisons  are  numerous.  The  commonest 
forms  of  poisoning  from  these — the  most  powerful 
poisons — are  morphine  (opium,  laudanum,  paregoric), 
strychnine  (nux  vomica),  atropine  (belladonna),  cocaine 
(coca),  aconitine  (aconite),  and  nicotine  (tobacco).  In 
acute  cases  of  opium  poisoning  the  classical  symptoms 
are  drowsiness,  coma,  small  pin-point  pupils,  loss  of  pain, 
slow  breathing  (6  to  8  to  a  minute),  moist  skin,  dry 
mouth,  rousing  with  more  or  less  active  consciousness,  and 
quick  relapse.  Strychnine  poisoning  causes  twitching  of 
muscles,  cramps,  irregular  muscular  movements,  con- 
vulsions at  slightest  jar  or  touch,  fixation  of  muscles 
of  breathing,  with  cyanosis.  Belladonna  poisoning  shows 
wide-awake,  restless  consciousness,  sometimes  active,  busy, 
delirium ;  dry  mouth,  skin  hot  and  flushed,  pupils  widely 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  115 

dilated  aud  paralysed  to  light  and  accommodation  ;  rapid, 
feeble  heart,  and  rapid  respiration. 

Another  group  of  poisons — the  glycosides — is  charac- 
terised by  a  great  similarity  in  action.  Many  of  these 
are  used  in  medicines,  and  some  were  used  on  arrow- 
points  by  wild  natives.  This  group  contains  digitalin 
(digitalis),  strophanthin  (strophanthus),  convallarin  (lily- 
of-the- valley),  bryonin  (bryonia),  apocynin  (dogbane), 
oleandrin  (oleander),  scillain  (squills),  &c.  They  are  all 
heart  poisons.  They  first  quicken  the  heart,  then  slow 
and  regulate  it,  hence  their  usefulness  in  many  heart 
diseases ;  but  in  overdoses  they  paralyse  the  heart. 

Toxic  albumins  form  a  group  of  special  character,  and 
all  are  very  violent.  Some  are  of  vegetable  and  others 
of  animal  origin.  The  most  important  are  abrin  (in 
jequirity  seeds),  ricin  (from  the  seed- coats  of  the  castor- 
oil  bean),  phallin  (in  poisonous  mushrooms),  rattlesnake 
poison,  cobra  poison,  heloderma,  and  the  poison  of 
lizards,  &c. 

4.  Death  by  Feeezing. 

Let  us  now  examine  a  few  of  the  numerous  cases 
that  have  been  reported  in  which  individuals  have 
frozen  to  death — and  almost  died,  but  afterwards 
recovered  to  tell  of  their  sensations.  We  have  ob- 
jective evidence  in  the  former  case ;  subjective  in  the 
latter ;  and  needless  to  say,  the  latter  is  by  far  the 
more  valuable.  The  objective  indications  of  freezing 
are  surely  too  well  known  to  need  re-statement — the 
whitening  and  deadening  of  the  parts;  the  numbness 
and  stupor  which  gradually  creep  over  the  body — all 
this  can  be  observed  by  an  outsider.  But  let  us  turn 
to  the  subjective  or  interior  state,  meanwhile,  and  see  in 
what  that  consists.  A  few  summarised  cases  will  do  for 
our  present  purposes  : — 


116  DEATH 

"  The  process  of  dying,  arising  from  freezing  and  the  con- 
sequent benumbed  feelings  and  sleepy  sensations,  is  undoubtedly 
painless.  When  a  person  feels  exceedingly  drowsy,  he  dislikes  to 
be  disturbed,  and,  when  freezing,  he  seems  to  be  oblivious  to  the 
great  dangers  that  threaten  him.  This,  as  a  natural  consequence, 
arises  from  the  weakness  of  the  will — however  that  may  be  caused 
— and  a  disposition  to  quietly  submit  to  the  domineering  actions 
of  the  feelings.  Sleepiness  caused  by  freezing  is  enervating ;  the 
brain  ceases  to  be  stimulated  in  the  proper  manner,  and  vague 
dreams,  accompanied  with  strange  illusions,  succeed  the  active 
energies  and  thoughtfulness  of  the  mind.  In  extreme  cold,  the 
physical  system  is  outside  of  its  sphere  of  normal  healthy  element, 
the  same  as  it  would  be  if  thrust  into  water,  in  a  well  where  gas 
would  stifle  it,  or  in  an  oven,  where  it  would  gradually  roast.  .  .  . 
Freezing  may  be  denominated  the  '  sleep  of  death,'  for  a  sleep,  calm 
and  peaceful,  precedes  the  final  dissolution,  and  the  awakening 
can  only  be  in  that  region  towards  which  all  are  tending.  Of 
course  such  a  death,  after  the  first  tingling  sensations  have  quietly 
passed  away,  must  be  painless.  Few,  however,  seek  that  method 
to  commit  suicide.  The  first  exposure  to  the  cold  is  very  dis- 
agreeable, and  those  intent  on  self-murder  hesitate  before  they 
expose  themselves  to  its  initiatory  influence — hence  they  oftener 
use  the  pistol,  or  poison,  or  jump  into  the  water." 

Another,  narrating  the  sensations  while  "  dying,"  thus 
describes  them : — 

''Thousands  of  coloured  lights  danced  before  her  eyes ;  ^  the  roar 
of  a  thousand  cannon  was  sounding  in  her  ears,  and  her  feet 
tingled  as  if  a  million  needle-points  were  sticking  into  them  as  she 
walked.  Then  a  feeling  of  drowsiness  came  over  her.  A  delight- 
ful feeling  of  lassitude  ensued — a  freedom  from  all  earthly  care 
and  woe.  Her  babe  was  warm  and  light  as  a  feather  in  her  arms. 
The  air  was  redolent  with  the  breath  of  spring.  A  delightful 
melody  resounded  in  her  ears.  She  sank  to  rest  on  downy  pillows, 
with  the  many  coloured  lights  dancing  before  her  in  resplendent 
beauty,  and  knew  nothing  more  until  she  was  brought  to  her  senses." 


It  is  related  in  the  third  person. 


1 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  117 

Still  another  writes  : — 

"  The  bitter  cold  does  not  chill  and  shake  a  person,  as  in  damper 
climates.  It  stealthily  creeps  within  all  defences,  and  nips  at  the 
bone  without  warning.  Riding  along  with  busy  thoughts,  a  quiet, 
pleasurable  drowsiness  takes  possession  of  the  body  and  mind,  the 
senses  grow  indistinct,  the  thoughts  wander,  weird  fancies  come 
trooping  about  with  fantastic  forms,  the  memory  fails,  and,  in  a 
confused  dream  of  wife  and  home,  the  soul  steps  out  into  oblivion 
without  a  pang  or  a  regret." 

There  are  several  distinguishing  marks  between  rigor 
mortis  and  a  body  that  has  been  frozen  to  death.  In 
cadaveric  rigidity  the  skin  is  soft  and  pliant ;  in  the 
frozen  body  it  is  not.  In  cadaveric  rigidity,  when  we 
move  the  limbs  there  is  no  sound ;  but  in  frozen  bodies 
a  crackling  sound  is  emitted. 

5.  Death  by  Starvation. 

The  length  of  time  it  is  possible  to  live  without 
food  varies  greatly  in  warm  and  cold-blooded  animals. 
Chossat  found  that  in  different  warm-blooded  animals 
death  resulted  when  the  body  had  lost  about  40  per 
cent,  of  its  normal  weight.  He  found  that  in  ani- 
mals undergoing  starvation  the  symptoms  observed 
during  the  first  half  or  two-thirds  of  the  period  are 
those  of  calmness  and  quietness ;  the  temperature  then 
becoming  elevated,  restlessness  and  agitation  prevail ; 
and  when  life  is  terminated  by  the  rapid  fall  of  the 
temperature,  stupor  supervenes.  There  can  be  no  doubt 
that  individuals  can  subsist  without  food  far  longer  than 
is  usually  supposed — many  cases  of  sixty-day  fasts,  and 
even  of  longer  duration,  being  recorded  from  time  to 
time  in  various  medical  works.  These  cases  have  been 
studied  from   the  point  of  view  of  starvation  pure  and 


118  DEATH 

simple ;  and,  when  the  individual  is  normal  at  the  time 
of  commencing  such  a  starving  process,  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  the  effects  noted  would  be  such  as  are 
mdicative  of  harmful  results  to  the  organism. 

Starvation  only  occurs,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  after  a 
much  longer  time  than  is  generally  supposed.  A  man 
may  exist  for  two  or  even  three  months  without  food, 
under  certain  conditions ;  and,  during  the  first  part  of 
that  time,  even  receive  benefit  from  the  abstinence.  That 
is  while  fasting,  however,  and  not  during  the  period  of 
starvation.  The  two  processes  are  very  different,  as  one 
of  us  has  elsewhere  tried  to  show  at  considerable  length. 
(See  Vitality,  Fasting  and  Nutrition,  p.  564.)  When 
fasting  ends,  starvation  begins,  and  that  is  a  very  different 
thing.  Then  the  tissues  shrink,  the  body  wastes,  and 
the  mind  becomes  impaired.  The  moral  faculties  also 
become  blunted,  there  is  good  reason  to  believe ;  cases 
of  cannibalism  among  civilised  people  would  seem  to 
indicate  this.  Dr.  N.  E.  Davies,  writing  some  years  ago 
on  this  question  in  the  Popular  Scie7ice  Monthly,  said : — 

"  Reasoning  by  analogy,  we  find  that,  in  many  cases  of  bodily 
disease,  the  state  of  the  mind  is  the  first  indicator  of  the  mischief 
going  on  in  the  system.  Take  even  such  a  simple  thing  as  in- 
digestion, which,  as  every  one  must  know,  is  only  a  manifestation 
of  a  deranged  stomach,  and  what  do  we  find  ?  That  the  lowness 
of  spirits  induced  by  the  affection  may  vary  from  slight  dejection 
and  ill-humour  to  the  most  extreme  melancholy,  sometimes  induc- 
ing even  a  disposition  to  suicide.  The  sufferer  misconceives  every 
act  of  friendship,  and  exaggerates  slight  ailments  into  heavy 
grievances.  So  in  starvation,  the  power  of  reason  seems  paralysed, 
and  the  intellectual  faculty  dazed  really  before  the  functions  of  the 
body  suffer,  or  even  the  wasting  of  its  tissues  becomes  extreme. 
Such  being  the  case,  the  unfortunate  individual  is  not  accountable 
for  his  actions,  even  if  they  be  criminal  in  character,  long  before 
death  puts  an  end  to  his  sufferings." 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  119 


6.  Death  by  Asphyxia  and  Drowning. 

In  asphyxia  there  is  more  or  less  complete  loss 
of  consciousness,  because  of  imperfect  oxidation  of 
the  blood.  The  symptoms  may  be  developed  rapidly 
or  slowly.  In  sudden  occlusion  of  the  air  passages, 
such  as  is  caused  by  a  foreign  body  in  the  larynx,  or 
compression  of  the  throat,  as  in  hanging,  there  is 
usually  a  quiet  period  of  from  twenty  to  thirty  seconds, 
after  which  respiratory  movements  both  of  inspiration 
and  of  expiration  follow.  These  gradually  increase  in 
frequency  and  depth  until,  in  about  a  minute,  powerful 
expiratory  convulsions  occur;  convulsive  movements  of 
inspiration  are  also  produced,  but  these  are  usually 
milder  in  character.  A  period  of  exhaustion  sets  in,  the 
respiratory  movements  become  slower  and  more  irregular, 
and  gradually  cease.  During  this  period  the  face  has 
become  pallid,  and  then  deeply  cyanosed  and  flushed,  the 
lips  blue  to  purple,  and  the  body  temperature,  at  first 
increased,  gradually  diminishes.  The  blood-pressure  is 
at  first  increased,  and  then  falls  gradually  to  zero.  Un- 
consciousness develops  about  a  minute  after  the  occlusion, 
although  there  is  great  individual  variation ;  the  sphincters 
relax  and  the  urine  and  faeces  are  passed.  There  is  a 
loss  of  muscle  tone,  and  the  reflexes  are  abolished.  In 
asphyxia  both  lack  of  oxygen  and  increase  of  carbonic 
acid  gas  in  the  blood  are  important  factors. 

Among  the  most  important  phenomena  that  are  to  be 
observed  are  the  following : — The  cooling  of  the  body  is 
generally  slower  in  all  forms  of  death  from  asphyxia. 
Then  in  asphyxia  the  blood  is  always  very  fluid,  and  few 
clots  are  found  in  the  heart  or  great  vessels.  Owing  to 
this  fluidity,  hypostasis  is  well  marked.  The  blood  is 
generally  very  dark  in  colour.      The   next  point   is   the 


120  DEATH 

congested  condition  of  the  lungs.  Small  patches  appear 
at  the  root  of  the  lungs.  Tardieu  considers  them  dis- 
tinctive of  suffocation,  but  in  this  he  is  probably  too 
dof^^matic. 

In  strangulation  we  have  the  circulation  to  and  from 
the  brain  impeded.  The  face  is  commonly  pale  and 
placid ;  prominent  eyes  are  not  uncommon.  Protrusion 
of  the  tongue  appears  frequently ;  the  hands  are  often 
clenched. 

"Death  by  asphyxia  begins  at  the  lungs,  almost  simultaneously 
paralysing  the  muscles  of  the  body.  The  victim  is  deprived  of  the 
power  of  action,  while  still  retaining  consciousness.  Not  even  an 
outcry  is  possible,  and  death  approaches  inch  by  inch — relentlessly 
entangling  the  agonised  victim  in  its  skeins,  from  which  there  is 
no  escape,  unless  timely  help  arrives  before  the  last  stage  in  the 
passive  struggle.  While  still  conscious,  the  brain,  in  its  attempts 
to  break  the  chains  of  death,  pictures  the  past  and  present  in  vivid 
colours,  flashing  like  lightning  over  the  memory,  which  still  has 
a  conception  that  the  end  is  coming." 

This  picture-forming  faculty  of  the  mind  at  the 
moment  of  death  is  supposed  to  be  most  common  in 
cases  of  drowning.  The  past  will  come  up  before  the 
mind  with  marvellous  rapidity  and  detail,  at  such  times ; 
and  the  latter  would  seem  to  know  no  limitations  of 
time  or  space.  This  is  a  most  significant  fact,  to  which 
we  shall  recur  in  Part  III.  of  the  present  work.  Mean- 
while, it  may  be  said  that  in  all  such  cases,  of  death  from 
strangulation,  asphyxia,  &c.,  the  blood  becomes  nearly 
hlack,  by  reason  of  its  passing  through  the  lungs  several 
times  without  aeration.  When  death  results  from  the 
taking  of  opium,  and  certain  other  drugs,  it  is  said 
that  consciousness  of  the  entire  body  is  lost  before  the 
senses  or  intellect  become  dulled ;  but  this  seems  to  us 
very  doubtful. 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  121 


7.  Death  from  Shock. 

It  is  asserted  that,  in  many  cases  of  this  character, 
the  patient  may  be  brought  back  to  life  by  careful 
and  persistent  treatment — on  the  line  of  "  first  aid 
to  the  injured."  Kesuscitation  may  be  effected,  it  is 
claimed,  just  as  in  cases  of  drowning,  in  many  instances. 
Shock  of  this  character  may  produce  "  death  "  in  either 
one  of  three  ways :  First,  by  producing  destructive  tissue 
changes,  when  death  is  absolute ;  second,  by  producing 
sudden  arrest  of  the  respiratory  and  heart  muscles  through 
excitement  of  the  nerve  centres,  when  death  is  only  ap- 
parent— in  other  words,  animation  is  merely  suspended ; 
or,  third,  by  a  temporary  exhaustion  of  nerve  force — the 
result  of  a  violent,  sudden,  and  excessive  expenditure 
of  it.  The  subject  may  be  aroused  from  this  syncope 
if  efforts  at  resuscitation  are  not  too  long  delayed.  In 
cases  of  this  character,  the  oxygen  treatment  is  some- 
times very  efficacious.  Electricity  or  even  cold  water 
may  be  applied  with  great  success  in  all  cases  of  "  shock." 

The  symptoms  of  shock  vary  greatly  according  to  the 
type  of  cause  and  the  individuality  of  the  patient.  Some- 
times the  symptoms  begin  at  once ;  under  other  circum- 
stances the  alleged  results  may  be  delayed  for  a  long 
period.  Surgical  shock  is,  perhaps,  one  of  the  most 
severe.  The  symptoms  of  all  forms  of  shock  are  very 
similar.  The  face  usually  becomes  blanched  and  pale, 
the  body  becomes  cold,  and  is  covered  with  a  clammy 
perspiration ;  the  hands  and  feet  usually  become  icy,  the 
brain  seems  to  be  in  a  whirl,  consciousness  is  lost,  or 
much  clouded.  The  pulse  is  usually  quickened;  the 
eyes  sunken  and  listless. 

All  such  cases  bring  before  us  very  forcibly  the  pos- 
sibility  of  bodily  resuscitation.     Various   devices    have 


122  DEATH 

been  employed  to  this  end,  some  of  which  have  been 
mentioned  above ;  and  there  are  yet  others — artificial 
bellows,  &c.,  and  similar  moans — besides  the  well-known 
methods  classed  under  "  first  aid  to  the  injured."  In- 
jections of  certain  saline  solutions  into  the  veins  have 
sometimes  been  accompanied  with  remarkable  results. 
Perhaps  the  most  powerful  of  all  these  measures,  however, 
is  cardiac  massage.  It  has  been  asserted  that,  by  this 
means,  a  heart  has  been  made  to  beat  after  having 
stopped  for  several  minutes — thirty,  and  even  longer, 
according  to  some  reports  !  A  long  series  of  experiments 
should  be  conducted  along  these  lines,  and  the  results 
made  public.  So  far  as  we  know,  no  experiments  have 
ever  been  made  in  which  the  efficacy  of  suggestion — 
hypnotic  or  other — has  been  tried,  at  the  moment  of 
death. 

(We  must  except  Poe's  tale, ''  The  Case  of  M.  Valdemar  " 
— a  work  of  pure  fiction,  as  Poe  afterwards  admitted.) 

8.  Death  by  Electricity  and  Lightning. 

While  it  might  almost  be  said  that  the  body  died  first 
in  cases  of  freezing,  and  that  consciousness  was  only  ex- 
tinguished slowly  at  the  end,  precisely  the  reverse  of  this 
is  present  in  all  cases  of  electrocution,  or  death  by  elec- 
tricity. In  such  cases,  the  consciousness  is  certainly 
obliterated  at  once,  but  the  cell-life  of  the  body  as  certainly 
persists  for  a  long  time  after  the  electrocution  takes  place 
and  the  body  ultimately  putrefies,  as  in  other  cases.  In 
instances  of  freezing,  however,  it  is  very  different.  Here 
the  death  of  the  body  might  be  said  to  take  place  first ! 
But  these  are  questions  that  require  much  investigation 
in  order  to  settle  them  satisfactorily. 

It  has  been  asserted  that  a  large  proportion  of  cases 
of    electrocution    might    be    resuscitated    if    the   proper 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  123 

measures  were  adopted  at  once.  This  may  be  very 
true  in  certain  instances,  but  it  is  certainly  not  true 
in  the  great  majority  of  cases,  as  electrocution  is 
performed  to-day.  A  most  remarkable  instance  is 
reported,  however,  from  Pittsfield,  Mass.,  where,  on 
23rd  October  1894,  James  E.  Cutter,  working  in  the 
testing-room  of  the  Stanley  Electrical  Manufacturing 
Company,  accidentally  received  4600  volts  of  electricity, 
and  was  afterwards  resuscitated  by  two  fellow  electri- 
cians, who  treated  him  in  the  same  manner  as  one 
would  be  treated  who  had  become  unconscious  through 
drownino'.  At  the  end  of  seven  minutes  he  recovered. 
Writing  of  the  incident,  he  afterwards  said : — 

*'  For  a  brief  instant  there  was  a  sensation  as  if  I  were  being 
drawn  downwards  by  the  arms,  and  then  everything  became  blank. 
For  several  minutes  there  was  no  sign  of  life.  .  .  .  Then  slowly  I 
began  to  regain  consciousness  and  to  make  incoherent  remarks 
about  the  accident.  Half-an-hour  afterward  I  could  recall  every 
incident  before  and  after  the  seven  minutes'  interval,  which  was  a 
total  and  painless  blank.  The  accident  occurred  about  ten  o'clock 
in  the  morning.  For  the  remainder  of  the  day  I  was  quiet,  but 
on  the  following  day  I  was  around  as  usual.  I  have  experienced 
no  ill  effects  other  than  the  scars  from  the  burns,  one  of  which 
went  to  the  bone." 

As  is  well  known,  one  of  the  most  important  safe- 
guards of  the  human  body  against  the  passage  of 
electrical  currents  through  it  is  its  high  degree  of 
resistance.  This  degree  of  resistance,  however,  is  sub- 
ject to  a  considerable  amount  of  variation.  If  the 
skin  is  dry,  the  resistance  is  from  five  to  twenty  times 
as  great  as  when  the  skin  is  wet.  From  what  is  known 
of  the  amount  of  electrical  current  necessary  to  cause 
death  in  man,  it  is  probable  that  1600  volts  of  electro- 
motive force  of  a  continuous  current  is  sufficient  to  bring 


124  DEATH 

about  this  end,  and  that  an  alternating  current  of  half 
this  voltage  would  probably  be  fatal.  In  fact,  the 
general  deduction  has  been  drawn  from  the  experi- 
ments conducted  in  electrocution  work  at  the  Sing 
Sing  prison,  that  no  human  body  can  withstand  an 
alternating  current  of  1500  volts,  and  300  has  pro- 
duced death,  while  for  the  continuous  current  it  may 
be  necessary  to  pass  3000  volts,  in  order  to  bring 
about  fatal  results. 

The  number  of  deaths  from  lightning  is  larger  than 
would  be  ordinarily  supposed.  The  injuries  produced 
by  it  often  simulate  external  violence.  The  clothes  are 
frequently  torn  off  the  body,  and  part  of  the  clothes  or 
the  bodies  themselves  thrown  great  distances.  Again, 
we  may  find  metallic  things  about  the  body  fused,  and 
any  iron  thing  is  rendered  magnetic.  Marks  like  prints 
of  trees  or  foliage  may  occasionally  be  found  on  the 
body  after  it  has  been  struck,  as  though  photographed 
upon  it.  This  is  an  undoubted  fact.  Many  of  these 
caprices  of  lightning  are  very  striking.  At  one  time 
a  stroke  of  lightning  set  fire  to  a  man,  and  he  blazed 
like  a  sheaf  of  straw;  at  another  it  reduced  a  pair 
of  hands  to  ashes,  leaving  the  gloves  intact;  it  fused 
the  links  of  an  iron  chain  as  the  fire  of  a  forge  would 
do ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  it  has  killed  a  huntsman 
without  discharging  the  gun  which  he  held  in  his  hand ; 
it  has  melted  an  earring  without  burning  the  skin;  it 
has  consumed  a  person's  clothing  without  doing  him  the 
slightest  injury,  or  perhaps  only  destroyed  his  shoes  or 
his  hat;  it  has  gilded  the  pieces  of  silver  in  a  pocket- 
book  by  electro-plating  from  one  compartment  to  another 
without  the  owner  being  aware  of  it ;  it  has  demolished 
a  wall  six  or  eight  feet  thick  in  a  moment,  or  burned  a 
chateau  a  hundred  years  old,  yet  it  has  struck  a  powder 
factory  without  causing  an  explosion. 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  125 

Dr.  John  Knott,  writing  in  the  Neiv  York  Medical 
Journal,  says  : — 

"The  materialistic  nineteenth  century  does  not  fail  to  find  an 
explanation  in  what  has  since  been  recognised  as  return  shock. 
Every  substance  capable  of  conducting  the  mysterious  electrical 
fluid,  on  being  placed  in  the  vicinity  of  an  electrified  ("  charged  ") 
body — and  not  connected  with  the  same  by  a  conducting  medium 
— becomes  charged  with  electricity  of  the  opposite  kind,  and  to 
approximately  the  same  potential  or  electromotive  force.  In 
accordance  with  the  physical  necessity  which  determines  this 
process,  a  man  may  stand  within  a  moderate  distance  of  a 
thunder-cloud,  which  holds  an  enormous  charge  of,  let  us  say, 
positive  electricity.  In  such  position,  his  body  necessarily  becomes 
charged  with  negative  electricity,  by  the  influence  of  what  is 
known  as  induction.  While  the  state  of  equilibrium  is  maintained, 
without  any  abrupt  disturbance,  he  feels  no  ill  effect  or  incon- 
venience whatever.  But  when  that  cloud  discharges  its  electricity 
in  an  opposite  direction,  the  inductive  influence  instantaneously 
ceases ;  the  induced  negative  charge  is  (in  the  same  instant) 
neutralised  by  drawing  an  equal  quantity  of  positive  from  the 
"universal  reservoir"  of  the  earth.  The  shock  corresponds  in 
intensity  to  that  producible  by  the  discharge  by  the  cloud  itself, 
and  passes  through  the  nervous  system  with  such  effect  that  the 
individual  drops  dead  instantaneously,  and  without  a  single  trace 
of  injury  on  or  around  his  person." 

In  cases  of  direct  contact  with  the  lightning  flash, 
burns,  more  or  less  extensive  and  penetrating,  have  been 
noticeable ;  but  as  a  rule  there  is  nothing  very  remark- 
able about  them.  One  of  the  most  characteristic  signs 
of  the  post-viortem  conditions  in  cases  of  death  by  light- 
ning is,  that  when  the  shock  has  been  direct  and  very 
powerful,  the  blood  fails  to  coagulate  after  the  normal 
fashion.  (After  electrocution,  imperfect  coagulation  of 
blood  has  been  noticed,  giving  rise  to  the  supposition 
that  the  subject  is  not  really  dead.  Such,  however, 
does  not  follow,  as  we  have  seen.) 


126  DEATH 


9.  Death  by  Spontaneous  Combustion. 

Dr.  Trail,  in  his  Hydropathic  Encyclopcedia,  vol.  ii.,  pp. 

179-80,  says: — 

"This  is  a  condition  of  general  combustibility  of  the  body,  pro- 
duced by  the  use  of  alcoholic  drinks.  Examples  of  spontaneous 
combustion,  as  having  occurred  in  persons  long  accustomed  to  the 
immoderate  employment  of  spirituous  liquors,  are  too  well  authenti- 
cated to  be  longer  doubted.  The  condition  of  the  body  liable  to 
this  strange  phenomenon  may  properly  be  called  alcoholic  diathesis. 
In  a  majority  of  the  cases  recorded,  females  advanced  in  life  are  the 
subjects  of  the  malady.  In  some  cases  the  self-consuming  flame 
has  arisen  without  any  obvious  exciting  cause  ;  but  in  others  a  fire, 
a  lighted  candle,  the  heat  of  a  stove,  or  an  electric  spark,  has  ignited 
the  inebriate  body.  It  is  a  remarkable  fact  that  the  flame  which 
decomposes  and  reduces  every  fragment  of  the  bodily  structure  to 
ashes  does  not  essentially  injure  the  common  furniture  or  bedding 
with  which  it  comes  in  contact ;  and  more  marvellous  still  is  the 
statement  that  water,  instead  of  quenching  the  fire,  seems  rather 
to  quicken  it !  " 

Again,  Dr.  Joel  Shew,  in  his  Family  Physician,  pp. 
717-18,  says  of  this  condition: — 

"  That  the  living  body  becomes  at  times,  in  consequence  of  long- 
continued  intemperance  in  the  use  of  alcoholic  drinks,  liable  to 
combustion,  easily  excited  and  spontaneous,  is  abundantly  proved. 
The  condition,  however,  is  a  rare  one.  Some  doubt  the  facts,  but, 
as  a  French  writer  has  observed,  '  it  is  not  more  surprising  to  meet 
with  such  incineration  than  a  discharge  of  saccharine  urine  or  an 
appearance  of  the  bones  softened  to  a  state  of  jelly.' 

"  This  condition  of  the  system  will  appear  more  remarkable 
when  it  is  remembered  that  in  all  other  states,  whether  of  health 
or  disease,  the  body  is  with  difficulty  consumed  by  fire,  even  at  a 
high  temperature.   .   .  . 

"  This  phenomenon  seems  to  have  taken  place  for  the  most  part 
in  the  night  time,  and  when  the  sufi'erer  has  been  alone.     It  has 


THE  CAUSES  OF  DEATH  127 

usually  been  discovered  either  by  the  fetid,  penetrating  scent  of 
sooty  films,  which,  as  we  are  told,  have  spread  to  a  considerable 
distance ;  or  by  the  blue  flame  that  hovers  over  the  body ;  or  the 
unnatural  heat,  which,  however,  is  not  very  great.  The  patient  in 
all  cases  has  likewise  been  found  either  dead  or  so  far  consumed 
that  life  appeared  to  be  extinct ;  and  in  no  instance  has  recovery 
been  known  to  take  place  after  the  appearance  of  this  most  singular 
of  all  pathological  states." 

There  is  practically  no  belief  in  spontaneous  combus- 
tion in  these  clays,  but  it  is  admitted  that  in  certain  cases 
the  body  may  acquire  preternatural  combustibility.  This 
is  founded  on  the  assumed  fact  that  much  of  the  body 
has  been  found  consumed  while  surrounding  objects 
are  not  much  consumed.  In  nearly  all  well-authenticated 
cases  there  has  been  some  source  of  fire  near,  probably 
setting  the  clothes  on  fire,  usually  when  the  sufferer  was 
habitually  drunk  and  so  could  not  help  himself. 

It  is  of  interest  to  note,  in  this  connection,  that  a  case 
in  which  such  phenomena  occurred  after  death  recently 
came  under  our  own  observation.  The  patient  was  a 
child  who  had  died  of  acute  indigestion  caused  by 
eating  a  large  quantity  of  chestnuts  without  properly 
masticating  them.  After  a  day  spent  in  the  chestnut 
grove  the  child  returned  home,  and  about  three  o'clock 
in  the  morning  died  in  terrible  convulsions.  As  this 
occurred  in  the  country,  the  neighbours  volunteered  to 
prepare  the  body  for  burial,  and  it  was  while  the  work  of 
making  the  shroud  was  in  progress  that  it  Avas  discovered 
that  the  entire  body  was,  to  all  appearances,  on  fire. 
The  glow  extended  from  the  head  to  the  feet,  and  could 
not  be  extinguished,  although  it  finally  died  out,  dis- 
appearing altogether.  While  the  heat  from  the  bluish 
flames  that  enveloped  the  body  was  quite  perceptible,  it 
was  not  sufficient  to  burn  the  body  or  even  set  the  bed 
on  fire ;  and  yet,  when  the  corpse  was  removed  from  the 


128  DEATH 

sheet  on  which  it  had  been  placed,  it  was  found  that  the 
latter  was  scorched  in  such  a  manner  that  the  outlines 
of  the  human  figure  could  be  plainly  distinguished.  In 
this  case,  it  will  be  noted,  alcohol  played  no  part  in  the 
production  of  the  phenomenon,  but  there  can  be  no  doubt 
that  the  chemical  changes  were  similar  in  character  to 
the  cases  previously  cited. 

Although  we  have  the  names  of  all  persons  concerned 
in  this  case,  and  it  has  been  thoroughly  authenticated, 
the  identity  of  the  family  is  withheld  by  request. 


CHAPTER  VII 

OLD  AGE:   ITS  SCIENTIFIC   STUDY 

This  subject  is  of  great  interest  as  possibly  throwing 
some  light  on  the  question  of  natural  death.  Certainly 
it  is  a  question  that  should  receive  the  closest  attention 
from  scientists.  Of  late  years  M.  Metchnikoff,  of  Paris, 
has  given  it  much  thought,  and  we  shall  have  occasion 
to  mention  his  work  immediately.  First,  however,  a  few 
preliminary  remarks. 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  average  length  of  life 
of  the  human  race  should  be  far  greater  than  it  is  now. 
Every  animal  is  supposed  to  live  at  least  five  times  as 
long  as  it  takes  to  mature ;  this  is  the  all  but  invariable 
rule  in  the  animal  world,  and  should  hold  good  for  man 
also.  He  matures  about  twenty,  let  us  say.  According 
to  our  rule,  therefore,  he  should  live  to  be  a  hundred,  and 
that  without  growing  decrepit  or  without  being  regarded 
as  exceptionally  old  or  long-lived  !  That  should  be  his 
normal  age  limit.  But,  instead  of  this,  what  do  we  find  ? 
That  the  averaofe  duration  of  human  life  is  a  fraction 
over  forty-two  years;  and,  more  than  that,  these  forty- 
two  years  are  filled  with  grievous  diseases  and  illnesses 
of  all  sorts,  instead  of  health  and  happiness.  Something 
is  assuredly  wrong  somewhere,  and  one  of  us  has  attempted 
to  show  at  some  length  that  the  chief  cause  of  all  this 
trouble  lies  in  the  perverted  food-habits  of  the  people. 
But  it  is  enough  to  say  here  that  life  is  far  shorter 
in  duration  than  it  should  be,  and  that  practically  every 

129  J 


130  DEATH 

one  dies  prematurely.  The  great  majority  die  either 
from  some  disease  or  from  some  "  sudden  death,"  which, 
as  we  have  shown,  is  not  really  sudden  death  at  all,  but 
the  sudden  culmination  of  an  unobserved  diseased  condi- 
tion. Of  course,  all  such  persons  do  not  die  naturally, 
and  it  is  probable  that  very  few  indeed  do  die  what  might 
be  called  a  "  natural  death."  :^JPhysiology  knows  no  reason 
why  the  body  should  ever  wear  out,  provided  the  organs 
remain  sound  and  health  be  maintained !  This  may 
be  doubted,  but  it  is  a  fact.  Thus,  Dr.  William  A. 
Hammond  stated  that  ''  there  is  no  physiological  reason 
at  the  present  day  why  men  should  die."  G.  H.  Lewes, 
in  his  Physiology  of  Common  Life,  also  said  :  "  If  the  repair 
were  always  identical  with  the  waste,  never  varying  in 
the  slightest  degree,  life  Avould  then  only  be  terminated 
by  some  accident,  never  by  old  age."  Dr.  Munro  asserted 
that  "  the  human  body  as  a  machine  is  perfect  ...  it 
is  apparently  intended  to  go  on  for  ever."  Dr.  Gregory, 
in  his  Medical  Conspectus,  wrote :  "  Such  a  machine  as  the 
human  frame,  unless  accidentally  depraved  or  injured 
by  some  external  cause,  would  seem  formed  for  perpe- 
tuity." Other  authors  could  be  quoted  to  like  effect. 
Mr.  Harry  Gaze,  indeed,  devoted  a  whole  book  to  this 
question,  and  tried  to  show  why  we  need  never  die  if  we 
only  made  up  our  minds  to  stay  alive  !  ^  The  arguments 
against  this  position  have  been  given  elsewhere.^ 

At  all  events,  it  will  be  seen  that  the  great  majority 
of  persons  die  prematurely.  The  greatest  number  of 
such  premature  deaths  are  from  diseases  of  various  kinds. 
Such  causes  of  death  are  analysed  and  classified  in  a 
little  book  entitled  Premature  Death.  Here  we  read  that 
nine- tenths  at  least  of  all  deaths  are  premature  !  (p.  5), 
and  this  is  doubtless  short  of  the  truth.     All  accidental 

^  IIoxo  to  Live  Forever. 

2  Vitality,  Fasting  and  Nutrition,  pp.  328-29. 


OLD  AGE:  ITS  SCIENTIFIC  STUDY       131 

deaths  are,  of  course,  also  premature ;  so  that  the  margin 
of  cases  of  natural  death  is  small  indeed.  It  is  amazing, 
when  we  consider  this  fact,  that  so  little  attention  is  paid 
to  it  either  by  doctors  or  the  public.  However,  this  is 
not  the  place  to  consider  that  question. 

On  page  14  of  the  book  just  quoted,  the  author  makes 
the  following  assertion  : — 

"  With  the  completion  of  manhood,  diseases  indicative  of  local 
degenerations  of  tissue  begin  to  be  predominant,  and,  with  each 
successive  stage  of  life,  this  predominance  becomes  more  marked. 
In  old  age  the  degenerative  changes,  which  at  earlier  periods  of 
life  are  regarded  as  the  signs  of  disease,  now  appear  as  the  natural 
consequences  of  decay,  and  death  becomes  a  physiological,  not  a 
pathological  fact — as  the  termination  of  a  natural  life,  not  as  the 
premature  close  of  a  life  cut  short  by  disease."  ^ 

Is  this  so  ?  We  believe  the  truth  to  be  entirely  other- 
wise. So  far  as  we  can  see,  there  is  no  reason  whatever 
for  supposing  that  the  degenerative  changes  that  take 
place  late  in  life  are  any  more  ''  physiological "  than  they 
are  at  its  beginning.  They  are  due  to  excesses  in  diet 
and  other  unhygienic  methods  of  living,  and  the  body 
should  die  as  free  from  disease  as  it  entered  the  world. 
Then  why  does  the  body  die  at  all  ?  The  difficulty  in 
conceiving  a  real  cause  for  natural  death  has  been  due  to 
the  materialistic  science  of  the  past  century ;  and,  when 
the  body  is  looked  at  from  another  standpoint  than  that 
of  a  mere  bundle  of  matter  and  force,  we  shall  be  enabled 

^  Metchnikoff  takes  this  view  very  strongl5^  He  says,  in  part: — "It 
has  often  been  said  that  old  age  is  a  kind  of  disease.  ...  In  fact  the 
great  resemblance  between  these  states  is  incontestable.  .  .  .  The  theory 
of  old  age  and  the  hypotheses  which  are  connected  with  it  may  be  sum- 
marised in  a  few  words  :  The  senile  degeneration  of  our  organism  is  entirely 
similar  to  the  lesions  induced  bj  certain  maladies  of  a  microbic  origin. 
Old  age,  then,  is  an  infectious  chronic  disease  which  is  manifested  by  a 
degeneration,  or  an  enfeebling  of  the  nobler  elements,  and  by  an  excessive 
activity  of  the  macrophages." — Old  Age,  by  Elie  Metchnikoff.  Smithsoniaii 
Beport,  pp.  542-48. 


132  DEATH 

to  find  out  the  cause  of  natural  death  easily  enough. 
However,  we  reserve  that  discussion  for  a  later  period ; 
at  present  we  arc  engaged  in  a  consideration  of  "old  age" 
and  its  phenomena. 

Metchnikoff  holds  that,  if  death  were  due  to  old  age, 
it  would  be  sought  for  and  anxiously  awaited  (instead  of 
being  dreaded  and  feared),  just  as  we  long  for  the  night's 
sleep  after  a  day  of  hard  and  trying  work.  It  is  probable 
that  this  is  the  case.  It  is  probable  that  nature  intended 
just  such  a  plan.  The  dread  of  death  that  is  so  universal 
merely  shows  us  that,  in  practically  all  cases,  death  has 
been  premature  ;  it  has  come  before  it  was  wanted — 
before  its  appointed  time,  f  There  is  every  reason  to 
believe,  and  every  analogy  points  to  the  fact,  that  death 
should  be  welcomed,  as  sleep  is  welcomed,  by  those  fatigued. 
Metchnikoff  adduced  some  cases  in  support  of  his  con- 
tention ;  and  he  is  probably  right  in  his  central  claim.  ) 

Old  age  is  invariably  regarded  as  a  period  of  decrepi- 
tude and  mental  imbecility.  And,  although  this  is,  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  the  all  but  invariable  rule,  there  is  no  real 
reason  why  such  should  be  the  case.  Hardly  any  of  the 
wild  animals  show  signs  of  decrepitude  in  a  similar  manner, 
and  only  some  of  the  domestic  animals  do.  The  rule  would 
seem  to  be  that  the  closer  we  live  to  nature,  the  longer  is 
death  postponed,  and  the  more  painless  and  sudden  it  is. 
Those  living  as  the  majority  do,  and  indulging  to  an  un- 
limited extent  in  rich  foods,  dissipations  of  all  sorts,  and 
what  are  generally  known  as  the  "  good  things  of  this 
world,"  do  degenerate  prematurely  and  early  lose  their 
mental  and  moral  fibre,  no  less  than  their  physical  bodies. 
Decay  is  the  rule ;  uselcssness  is  the  general  condition  of 
the  aged  with  most  civilised  nations — and  even  of  some 
that  are  not  civilised !  The  inhabitants  of  Tierra  del  Fuego, 
for  example,  kill  their  old  women  before  they  kill  their 
dogs,  when  they  are  threatened  with  famine.    When  asked 


OLD  AGE:   ITS  SCIENTIFIC  STUDY       133 

why  they  do  this,  they  reply  :  "  Dogs  catch  seals,  while  old 
women  do  not!"  Although  civilised  nations  do  not  adhere 
to  the  doctrine  of  survival  of  the  fittest  so  relentlessly,  they 
nevertheless  show  by  word  and  action  very  frequently  that 
they  wish  the  day  would  come  when  such  "nuisances" 
shall  be  removed. 

Now  let  us  give  a  brief  survey  of  what  is  known  of  old 
age  and  its  causes,  and  some  of  the  theories  that  have 
been  advanced  from  time  to  time  to  explain  its  phenomena. 
Very  few  of  these  need  be  considered,  as  they  are  not  either 
clear  enough  or  comprehensive  enough  to  deserve  such  dis- 
cussion. A  few  of  them,  however,  are  very  ingenious,  and 
deserve  careful  consideration. 

Certain  authors  have  advanced  what  might  be  called  a 
''  psychological  "  theory  of  old  age  and  death.  One  grows 
old  and  dies  when  there  is  no  longer  any  incentive  to  live. 
As  Dr.  E.  Teichmann  expressed  it :  "  They  grow  old  be- 
cause they  are  no  longer  occupied  with  life."  ^  This 
theory  would  completely  fail  to  account  for  the  pheno- 
mena of  old  age,  even  if  it  succeeded  in  accounting  for 
death.  There  are  many  pathological,  degenerative  pheno- 
mena connected  with  old  age  which  must  be  taken  into 
account  in  this  connection — degenerations  which  are  not 
apparently  due  to  any  psychic  causes,  but  to  purely 
physical  conditions.  Such  a  theory  would  by  no  means 
explain  the  facts. 

"Numerous  scientists  affirm  that  old  age  finally  results  because 
it  is  impossible  for  an  organism  to  repair  the  cellular  losses  by  the 
formation  of  a  sufficient  number  of  new  elements — that  is  to  say, 
because  of  the  exhaustion  of  the  reproductive  faculty. 

"  One  of  the  scientists  who  has  more  especially  concerned 
himself  with  general  questions,  Weismann,  expresses  himself 
on  this  subject  in  a  very  categorical  manner.     According  to  him, 

1  Lije  and  Death,  p.  145. 


134  DEATH 

the  senile  degeneration  that  ends  in  death  does  not  depend  on  the 
wearing  away  of  the  cells  of  our  organism,  but  rather  upon  the  fact 
that  cellular  proliferation,  being  limited,  becomes  insufficient  to 
repair  that  loss.  As  old  age  appears  in  different  species  and 
different  individuals  at  various  ages,  Weismann  concludes  that  the 
number  of  generations  that  a  cell  is  capable  of  producing  differs  in 
different  cases.  It  is,  however,  impossible  for  him  to  explain  why, 
in  one  example,  cellular  multiplication  may  stop  at  a  certain  figure, 
while  in  another  it  may  go  much  further. 

*'  The  theory  appears  so  plausible  that  no  attempt  has  been  made 
to  support  it  by  precise  facts.  We  even  see,  in  the  most  recent 
attempt  at  a  theory  of  old  age  by  Dr.  Biihler,  the  thesis  of  the 
exhaustion  of  the  reproductive  power  of  the  cells  accepted  and 
developed  without  sufficient  discussion.  It  cannot  be  denied  that 
it  is  during  embryonic  life  that  cells  are  produced  with  the  greatest 
activity.  Later  on  this  proliferation  becomes  slower,  but  it  never- 
theless continues  throughout  the  course  of  life.  Biihler  attributes 
the  difficulty  with  which  wounds  heal  in  the  aged  precisely  to  the 
insufficiency  of  cellular  production.  He  also  thinks  that  the 
reproduction  of  the  cells  of  the  epidermis,  which  are  to  replace  the 
desiccated  parts  of  the  skin,  diminishes  notably  during  old  age. 
According  to  this  author,  it  is  theoretically  easy  to  predict  the 
moment  when  cellular  multiplication  of  the  epidermis  must  com- 
pletely cease  ;  as  the  desiccation  and  desquamation  of  the  superficial 
parts  continue  without  cessation,  it  becomes  evident  that  it  must 
finally  result  in  the  total  disappearance  of  the  epidermis.  The 
same  rule  is  applicable,  according  to  Biihler,  to  the  genital  glands 
and  muscles,  and  all  sorts  of  other  organs." — Old  Age^  pp.  538-39. 

Metclmikoff  advances  several  arguments  against  this 
theory — none  of  which,  to  us,  appear  in  any  way  conclu- 
sive. A  much  stronger  argument  against  this  original- 
stock-of-energy  theory  is  to  be  found  in  such  a  case  as 
this.  A  person  has  an  attack  of  sickness,  and  almost 
dies.  He  comes  as  near  as  it  is  possible  to  dying,  without 
actually  doing  so.  Recovering,  however,  he  lives  on  for 
half-a-century,  in  comparatively  good  health.      Now,  at 


OLD  AGE:   ITS  SCIENTIFIC  STUDY       135 

the  time  of  the  sickness,  if  that  person  had  died,  the  re- 
productive power  of  his  cells  would  have  been  lost  for 
ever ;  and  yet,  simply  by  reason  of  the  fact  that  he 
turned  the  critical  point  and  recovered,  his  cells  continue 
to  reproduce  for  half-a-century  longer  !  Surely,  we  must 
give  up  the  notion  that  the  potential  energy  of  the 
cell  is  inherent  at  birth  in  such  a  case,  and  assume  that 
some  new  stock  of  energy  is  imbibed  from  some  external 
source,  sometime  later  on  in  life  ?  The  idea  that  the 
diseased  cell,  all  but  dead,  possessed  the  potential  energy 
to  reproduce  for  fifty  years,  while  still  in  that  condition, 
seems  too  absurd  to  need  criticism. 
Bichat  says  that : — 

"  In  the  death  which  is  the  effect  of  old  age  the  whole  of  the 
functions  cease,  because  they  have  been  successively  extinguished. 
The  vital  powers  abandon  each  organ  by  degrees;  digestion 
languishes,  the  secretions  and  absorptions  are  finished ;  the  capil- 
lary circulation  becomes  embarrassed ;  lastly,  the  general  circula- 
tion is  suppressed.  The  heart  is  the  ultimum  moriens.  Such, 
then,  is  the  great  difference  which  distinguishes  the  death  of  the 
old  man  from  that  which  is  the  effect  of  a  blow.  In  the  one,  the 
powers  of  life  begin  to  be  exhausted  in  all  the  parts,  and  cease  at 
the  heart;  the  body  dies  from  the  circumference,  towards  the 
centre ;  in  the  other,  life  becomes  extinct  at  the  heart,  and  after- 
wards in  the  parts;  the  phenomena  of  death  are  seen  extending 
themselves  from  the  centre  to  the  circumference." — Recherches  phy- 
siologiques  sur  la  Vie  et  la  Mort  (p.  143). 

These  conclusions  were  confirmed  by  a  number  of  cases 
cited  by  Dr.  John  D.  Malcolm  in  his  Physiology  of  Death 
from  Traumatic  Fever. 

Other  writers  have  attacked  this  problem  in  a  different 
manner.  They,  too,  have  contended  that  old  age  and 
death  are  due,  in  a  sense,  to  the  decrease  of  the  vitality 
of  the  body,  but  have  asked  themselves  the  question : 
Why  should  this  vitality  become  lessened  with  old  age, 


136  DEATH 

seeing  that  it  is  (supposedly)  constantly  being  replaced  by 
a  fresh  stock  of  vitality  from  the  food  which  is  eaten  all  the 
time  ?  On  the  theory  commonly  held,  the  bodily  energy 
is  supposed  to  come  from  the  food  we  eat,  and  that  is 
constantly  being  supplied  to  the  system — in  old  age,  as 
in  youth.  Why,  then,  should  these  degenerative  changes 
take  place,  and  the  vitality  decrease  ?  These  authors 
have  come  to  the  conclusion  that  the  vitality  depends 
upon  the  state  of  the  body — its  health;  and,  so  soon  as 
the  body  becomes  clogged  and  blocked,  as  the  result  of 
wrong  food-habits  and  other  causes,  old  age,  premature 
decay,  and  death  will  result. 

Two  writers  who  have  taken  this  view  are  Dr.  Homer 
Bostwick,  who  published  his  Inquirij  into  the  Cause  of 
Natural  Death;  or,  Death  from  Old  Age,  in  1851  ;  and  Dr. 
De  Lacy  Evans,  M.R.C.S.E.,  who  issued  his  book.  How  to 
Frolo7ig  Life :  An  Inq^idry  into  the  Cause  of  Old  Age  and 
Naturcd  Death,  about  1880.  The  similarity  of  the  views 
of  these  two  authors  is  very  remarkable,  but  each  appa- 
rently wrote  in  ignorance  of  the  work  of  the  other — one  in 
America,  the  other  in  England.  Yet  their  views  are  almost 
identical.  Both  authors  contend  that  "  induration  and 
ossification  are  the  causes  of  old  age  and  natural  death." 
Both  contend  that  these  are  the  true  causes,  and  not  the 
result,  of  old  age.  Both  these  authors  contend,  further, 
that  this  induration  and  ossification  are  due  to  the  excess 
of  lime  and  other  earthy  salts  that  have  accumulated 
Avithin  the  system  as  life  progressed;  that  old  age  ad- 
vances just  in  proportion  to  the  amount  of  this  earthy 
matter  in  the  system,  and  that  old  age  is  retarded  just  to 
the  extent  that  it  is  kept  out.  But  since  all  such  sub- 
stances can  only  be  introduced  into  the  system  through 
the  food  and  drink,  they  sought  to  find  those  foods  which 
contained  the  minimum  of  such  earthy  matter,  and  these 
they  found  to  be  fruits.     By  living  on  fruits,  then,  they 


OLD  AGE:   ITS  SCIENTIFIC  STUDY       137 

were  enabled  to  retard  the  progress  of  old  age  and  natural 
death,  both  in  themselves  and  in  all  others  who  undertook 
to  follow  their  diet.  Careful  analysis  of  the  various  foods 
confirmed  their  theory,  which  was  also  supported  by  a 
number  of  experimental  facts.  They  therefore  concluded 
that  this  was  man's  natural  diet — that  best  suited  to  his 
body ;  and  that,  by  eating  fruit,  man  could  very  largely 
retard  the  oncoming  of  old  age  and  natural  death. 

These  authors  made  the  degree  of  the  vitality  depend 
upon  the  condition  of  the  body — and  hence  upon  the 
food.  On  the  other  hand,  it  must  be  remembered  that 
the  utilisation  of  the  food,  and  its  successful  elimination, 
will  depend  upon  the  degree  of  vitality  present — i.e.  the 
vitality  will  depend  upon  the  state  of  the  body,  and  the 
state  of  the  body  will  depend  upon  the  degree  of  vitality. 
We  are  here,  therefore,  in  a  vicious  circle.  Nevertheless, 
we  think  that  these  authors  have  attacked  the  problem  in 
the  right  way,  and  we  shall  have  occasion  to  recur  to  their 
views  later  on,  when  we  come  to  consider  this  question  of 
the  relation  of  health  to  vitality  again.  There  are  also 
many  facts  that  support  such  a  view.  Let  us  consider 
some  of  these. 

The  most  marked  feature  in  old  age  is  that  a  fibrinous, 
gelatinous,  and  earthy  deposit  has  taken  place  in  the 
system — the  latter  being  chiefly  composed  of  phosphate 
and  carbonate  of  lime,  with  small  quantities  of  sulphate 
of  lime,  magnesia,  and  traces  of  other  earths.  The 
accumulation  of  these  solids  in  the  system  is  doubtless 
one  of  the  chief  causes  of  ossification,  premature  old  age, , 
and  natural  death.  In  the  hones  this  is  most  noticeable. 
The  amount  of  animal  matter  in  the  bones  decreases  with 
age,  while  the  amount  of  mineral  matter  increases.  This 
is  especially  marked  in  the  long  bones  and  the  bones  of 
the  head.  They  thus  clearly  show  us  that  a  gradual 
process  of  ossification  is  going  on  throughout  life. 


138  DEATH 

As  age  advances  the  muscles  diminisli  in  bulk,  the 
fibres  become  rigid  and  loss  contractile,  becoming  paler 
and  even  yellowish  in  colour,  and  are  not  influenced  by 
stimuli  to  the  same  extent  as  in  youth.  Tendons  also 
become  ossified  to  a  certain  extent,  while  there  is  a 
diminution  of  the  fluid  in  the  sheaths  of  the  tendons. 
The  brain  increases  in  size,  up  to  about  forty  years  of 
age,  when  it  reaches  its  maximum  weight.  After  this 
period  there  is  a  gradual  and  slow  diminution  in  weight 
of  about  one  ounce  in  every  ten  years.  According  to 
Cazanvieilh,  "  the  longitudinal  diameter  of  the  brain  of 
an  old  man,  compared  with  that  of  a  young  man,  is  six 
inches  one  line,  French  measure,  for  the  former,  and  six 
inches  four  lines  for  the  latter ;  whilst  the  transverse 
diameter  is  four  inches  ten  lines  in  the  old  man,  and 
five  inches  in  the  young  man."  The  convolutions  of  the 
brain  also  become  less  distinct  and  prominent. 

The  dura  mater  is  often  found  apparently  collapsed  or 
corrugated.  It  is  thickened  and  indurated,  and  ossific 
deposits  on  the  arachnoid  surface  are  very  common.  The 
membrane  is  sometimes  found  to  have  an  abnormal  dry- 
ness ;  the  arteries  supplying  the  brain  have,  in  old  age, 
become  thickened  and  lessened  in  calibre ;  the  supply  of 
blood  thus  becomes  less  and  less,  leading  to  the  mental 
imbecility  of  the  very  aged.  This  gradual  process  of 
degeneration  in  the  arteries,  not  only  in  the  brain  but 
throughout  the  body,  is  well  recognised,  and  is  perhaps 
one  of  the  most  important  of  all  the  changes  that  take 
place  in  old  age.  So  important  a  symptom  is  it  con- 
sidered, that  it  has  given  rise  to  the  old  saying  that  "  a 
man  is  as  old  as  his  arteries."  The  capillaries  also 
become  choked  or  blocked  and  clogged  up,  as  the  result 
of  the  earthy  matter  accumulated  in  the  system. 

These  changes  taking  place  in  the  arteries,  greater 
pressure   is   thrown   upon   the  veins,  which  dilate,  their 


OLD  AGE:   ITS  SCIENTIFIC  STUDY       139 

coats  becoming  thinner,  and  they  even  become  tortuous 
and  varicose. 

The  gradual  process  of  induration  and  hardening  going 
on  throughout  the  system  is  noticeable  also  in  the  heart 
— sfivinof  rise  to  various  affections  known  to  us  under  a 
variety  of  symptoms.  The  lungs  gradually  lose  their 
elasticity,  and  increase  in  density.  The  air-cells  and 
hronchi  become  dilated — hence  emphysema  and  chronic 
bronchitis  are  so  often  seen  in  the  aged. 

The  salivary  glands  become  hardened,  and  decrease  in 
bulk.  The  saliva  is  either  secreted  in  large  quantities, 
so  that  "  dribbling  "  takes  place,  or  in  quantities  so  small 
that  the  mouth  is  hardly  moistened.  These  changes  are 
probably  due  in  part  also  to  lack  of  central  inhibition. 

In  the  stomach  the  gastric  juice  is  secreted  in  a  diluted 
form,  and  is  deficient  in  pepsin ;  moreover,  the  muscular 
walls  of  the  stomach  gradually  lose  their  wonted  con- 
tractibility ;  the  peristaltic  motion  becomes  weak ;  chyme 
is  imperfectly  manufactured,  and  all  the  processes  of  diges- 
tion weakly  performed. 

The  liver  shows  the  effects  of  old  age  by  its  imperfect 
bile-forming  qualities.  Fatty  matters  are  not  thoroughly 
emulsified  or  absorbed  by  the  lacteals — though  this  maybe 
due  to  an  alteration  in  the  fluid  secretion  in  the  pancreas. 

In  the  intestines,  the  small  vessels  which  supply  the 
follicles  and  various  glands  become  indurated,  or  even 
clogged  up,  in  old  age.  The  walls  of  the  intestines 
become  opaque,  and  lose  their  contractibility,  while  the 
villi  containing  the  lacteals  undergo  the  same  gradual 
alteration.  It  will  be  seen  from  the  above  how  necessary 
it  is  that  all  food  should  be  restricted  in  quantity  and 
simplified  in  quality  in  old  age  !  Almost  all  the  viscera, 
and  particularly  those  glands  and  organs  connected  with 
the  sexual  apparatus,  show  signs  of  old  age.  The  walls 
and  structures  become  harder  in  texture,  and  less  pliable. 


140  DEATH 

In  the  eye,  in  old  age,  there  is  diminished  secretion  of 
the  aqueous  fluid  in  the  anterior  chamber,  the  cornea 
becomes  less  prominent,  the  pupil  becomes  more  dilated, 
from  lessened  nervous  sensibility — hence  distant  sight 
and  the  indistinct  and  confused  view  of  near  objects  in 
the  aged.  Cooper  states  that  the  retina,  in  old  age,  is 
found  "  thickened,  opaque,  spotted,  buff-coloured,  tough, 
and  in  some  cases  even  ossified."  Quain  called  attention 
to  the  fact  that  the  colour,  density,  and  transparency  of 
the  lens  presented  marked  differences  in  different  periods 
of  life.  In  old  age  it  becomes  flattened  on  both  surfaces, 
and  assumes  a  yellowish  or  amber  tinge.  It  loses  its 
transparency,  and  gradually  increases  in  toughness  and 
in  specific  gravity.  Cataract  is  rarely  found  in  the  young, 
but  frequently  in  the  aged. 

The  ear  is  subject  to  the  same  gradual  process  of 
ossification.  The  cartilages  of  the  external  ear  become 
hardened,  or  even  ossified  ;  the  glands  which  secrete  the 
ear-wax  undergo  the  same  alterations  as  are  found  in 
other  orlands.  The  secretion  becomes  less,  and  altered 
in  quality.  The  memhrana  tym2xt7ii  becomes  thickened 
and  indurated ;  the  ligaments  connecting  the  ossicles 
(maleus,  incus,  and  stapes)  become  hardened,  their  plia- 
bility is  lessened;  thus  vibrations  which  are  already 
imperfect,  owing  to  induration  of  the  memhrana  tympani, 
are  improperly  converted  by  the  ossicles  across  the 
cavity  of  the  tympanum,  by  means  of  the  internal  ear  (the 
structures  and  fluids  of  which  have  undergone  the  same 
processes  of  consolidation),  to  the  auditory  nerve,  the 
sensibility  of  which  decreases  with  the  senile  changes  of 
the  brain.  Hence  the  impaired  and  confused  hearing 
so  often  observed  in  aged  persons. 

The  whole  membrane  covering  the  tongue  becomes 
thickened  and  hardened  in  old  age ;  its  surface  becomes 
dry  and  furrowed,  while  the  blood-vessels  supplying  the 


OLD  AGE:   ITS  SCIENTIFIC  STUDY       141 

papillae  are  decreased  in  size ;  hence  the  sense  of  taste  is 
diminished. 

In  old  age  the  sense  of  smell  is  lessened,  owing  to 
the  hardening  of  the  membranes  and  internal  cartilages ; 
moreover,  the  fibres  of  the  olfactory  nerves  lose  their 
susceptibility. 

The  sense  of  touch  throughout  the  body  is  greatly 
diminished :  this  for  several  reasons.  The  sensibility  of 
the  nerves  is  lowered,  as  well  as  the  reactions  of  the 
centres.  The  epidermis  becomes  thickened  and  less 
sensitive.  The  capillaries  supplying  the  papillae  are  also 
lessened  in  calibre ;  the  action  of  the  various  sebaceous 
glands  is  also  diminished ;  the  skin  becomes  dry, 
shrunken,  and  leather-like.  It  thus  has  a  cracked  and 
furrowed  appearance,  and  has  a  tendency  to  pucker-up. 
Hence  the  wrinkles  of  old  persons.  In  old  age  the  skin 
contains  more  earthy  salts  than  in  youth. 

As  is  well  known,  the  teeth  are  almost  invariably  lost 
before  age  is  far  advanced — this  being  due  partly  to 
external  causes,  partly  to  the  lessening  and  corruption 
of  the  blood  supply,  upon  which  the  nutrition  of  the 
teeth  depends.     As  a  result  they  decay  and  fall  out. 

The  hair  is  generally  lost,  and  it  usually  becomes 
white.  The  cause  of  this  for  a  long  time  puzzled  physio- 
logists ;  but  it  is  now  pretty  conclusively  shown  that 
this  blanching  of  the  hair  is  due  to  the  action  of  certain 
micro-organisms,  which  devour  the  colouring  matter.  Of 
course  the  question  still  remains,  what  is  that  condition 
of  the  body  which  renders  possible  the  presence  of  these 
micro-organisms — which  certainly  do  not  exist  so  long 
as  health  is  maintained  ?  It  would  seem  to  us  that  this 
is  more  truly  the  cause  of  old  age.  However,  we  shall 
discuss  this  aspect  of  the  problem  a  little  further  on. 
Metchnikoff  s  theory  of  the  blanching  of  the  hair  fails  to 
account  for  certain  facts,  however — such  as  the  complete 


142  DEATH 

whitening  of  the  hair  over-night,  as  the  result  of  purely 
nervous  shock. 

In  old  age  the  stock  of  vitality  is  decreased,  but 
whether  this  is  due  to  the  state  of  the  blood,  or  of  the 
tissues,  or  both ;  or  whether  the  state  of  the  blood  and 
the  tissues  depends  upon  the  amount  of  vitality ;  and 
whether  this  vitality  can  be  replenished  as  life  advances, 
and  if  so,  how ;  or  whether  a  certain  fund  of  life  is 
inherent  in  every  living  organism  at  birth — which  no 
skill  of  man  can  add  to — all  these  are  questions  which 
we  cannot  now  discuss.  They  are  treated  at  considerable 
length  in  Vitality ,  Fasting  and  Nutrition,  ^^.  225—303,  to 
which  we  would  refer  the  reader  for  further  details. 

The  theory  has  been  advanced  that  we  grow  old  and 
die  for  the  reason  that  the  brain  and  nervous  system 
become  worn  out  because  of  the  constant  stimuli  that 
have  been  poured  upon  them  since  they  began  their 
natural  life.  They  are  simply  worn  out,  and  refuse  to 
function  longer  on  that  account. 

There  is  doubtless  a  grain  of  truth  in  this  theory,  but 
it  cannot  be  accepted  as  in  any  way  an  adequate  explana- 
tion of  the  facts.  For,  were  it  true,  it  is  obvious  that 
those  persons  who  experienced  the  greatest  number  of 
stimuli  in  their  life-times  would  be  the  first  to  wear  out, 
whereas  we  know  as  a  matter  of  fact  that  nearly  all 
persons  die  at  about  the  same  age,  no  matter  how  many 
or  how  powerful  the  stimuli  were  to  which  they  had 
been  subjected  in  their  life- times.  Indeed,  statistics 
would  seem  to  show  that  the  busy  man  of  the  great 
city,  the  mental  worker,  lives  far  longer  than  the 
farmer  and  the  man  who  lives  merely  a  vegetable 
existence  in  the  country.  Such  being  the  case,  it  is 
hard  to  see  how  this  theory  can  be  made  to  hold 
water. 

Then,   too,   we   have   the   "  cometh   up   as   a  flower " 


OLD  AGE:  ITS  SCIENTIFIC  STUDY       143 

theory.  When  we  regard  the  growth,  blooming,  and 
death  of  a  summer  flower — the  shooting  upward  of  the 
flower  stalk  of  a  poppy,  for  example,  with  its  blossoms, 
its  seeding,  and  the  suddenly  ensuing  juiceless  and  dead 
rigidity,  we  contemplate  phenomena  not  wholly  unlike 
what  takes  place  in  the  human  organism,  when  regarded 
in  the  large,  passing  from  infancy  to  maturity  and 
old  age. 

What  has  taken  place  in  the  poppy  stalk  ? 

One  class  of  plant  cells  has  developed,  multiplied,  and 
from  the  products  which  have  issued  from  them  have 
been  produced  the  stalk  proper  and  leaves.  Immediately 
another  class  has,  in  like  manner,  given  rise  first  to  the 
bud,  then  to  the  gorgeous  blossom  with  its  stamens  and 
pistils.  Fertilisation  follows  in  its  timed  order,  and 
later  another  class  of  cells  matures  as  seed. 

It  has  been  held  that  these  latter  cells  in  some  manner 
sap  and  eviscerate,  so  to  speak,  the  cells  of  every  other 
tissue  of  the  plant ;  and,  thus  sapping  them  of  their 
life  elements  or  germs,  condense  these  latter  in  the 
seed,  where  they  may  long  lie  dormant,  yet  capable  of 
producing  another  plant,  and  that  the  parent  plant, 
thus  sapped  and  eviscerated,  dies  naturally,  its  life 
being  virtually  taken  away  and  carried  forward  to  the 
seed  for  another  year. 

The  primary  object  of  all  plant  life,  then,  according  to 
this  theory,  is  the  perpetuation  of  the  species,  and,  that 
object  once  accomplished,  there  is  no  longer  any  ''use" 
for  the  plant,  which  dies  at  once  or  soon  after.  This 
same  idea  has  been  applied  to  animal  life,  and  even  to 
human  beings,  and  it  has  been  contended  that  the 
primary  object  of  living  is  to  bring  ever  new  specimens 
of  the  human  race  into  being. 

What  a  hollow  mockery !  An  endless  procession  of 
beings  with  no  other  aim  than  to  procreate,  to  perpetuate 


144  DEATH 

the  species — and  to  what  end  ?  That  the  offspring  may 
in  turn  procreate,  and  thus  the  farce  be  kept  up  for  ever ! 
Can  we  conceive  that  such  is  the  scheme  of  nature  ?  Is 
it  not  more  rational  to  suppose  that  the  aim  and  end  of 
living  is  to  enjoy,  and  that  only  one  function  (doubtless 
an  important  one,  but  only  one,  nevertheless)  is  to  per- 
petuate the  race  ?  Would  this  not  seem  to  be  borne 
out  by  the  fact  that  the  parents  do  not  die,  or 
apparently  even  shorten  their  lives  in  the  slightest 
degree,  by  giving  birth  to  children,  whereas  if  this 
theory  were  true,  that  should  be  one  of  the  cardinal 
and  central  features  of  it  ?  The  theory  cannot  be  said 
to  withstand  the  test  of  experience  any  more  than  the 
attacks  of  logic  and  common  sense. 

As  we  have  said  above,  most  authors  are  inclined  to 
regard  old  age  as  a  process  of  rapid  decay  and  degene- 
ration— e.g.  MetchnikoflP,  quoted  before.  Some  authors, 
however,  are  not  at  all  disposed  to  take  this  stand.  Dr. 
Charles  S.  Minot,  e.g.,  is  inclined  to  take  an  entirely 
different  view  of  the  matter.  So  far  from  regarding 
old  age  as  some  sort  of  disease  that  is  to  be  avoided,  he 
contends  that  we  are  ageing  far  more  slowly  in  old  age 
than  we  do  in  youth,  and  that  the  rate  of  decay  is  in 
precisely  inverse  proportion  to  that  generally  held  to  be 
true.  He  produces  a  great  mass  of  evidence  in  favour 
of  this  contention,  for  which  the  reader  is  referred  to  his 
excellent  and  interesting  volume  on  the  subject  (Age, 
Growth  and  Death),  but  the  folloAving  quotations  may 
be  accepted  as  exemplifying  this  author's  theory : — 

"  Rejuvenation  is  accomplished  chiefly  by  the  segmentation  of 
the  ovum.  ...  As  we  define  senescence  as  an  increase  and  differen- 
tiation of  the  protoplasm,  so  we  must  define  rejuvenation  as  an 
increase  of  the  nuclear  material.  ...  If  it  be  true  that  growing 
old  depends  upon  the  increase  of  the  protoplasm,  and  the  propor- 
tional diminution  of  the  nucleus,  we  can  perhaps  in  the  future 


OLD  AGE:   ITS  SCIENTIFIC  STUDY       145 

find  some  means  by  which  the  activity  of  the  nucleus  can  be 
increased  and  the  younger  system  of  organisation  thereby 
prolonged.  .  .  .  We  can  formulate  the  following  laws  of 
cytomorphosis  : — 

"  First,  cytomorphosis  begins  with  an  undifferentiated  cell. 

"  Second,  cytomorphosis  is  always  in  one  direction,  through  pro- 
gressive differentiation  and  degeneration  towards  the  death  of 
the  cells. 

"Third,  cytomorphosis  varies  in  degree  characteristically  for 
each  tissue.  .  .  . 

"  Finally,  if  my  arguments  before  be  correct,  we  may  say  that 
we  have  established  the  following  four  laws  of  Age  : — 

"First,  rejuvenation  depends  on  the  increase  of  the  nuclei. 

"  Second,  senescence  depends  on  the  increase  of  the  protoplasm 
and  on  the  differentiation  of  the  cells. 

"  Third,  the  rate  of  growth  depends  on  the  rate  of  senescence. 

"  Fourth,  senescence  is  at  its  maximum  in  the  very  young  stages, 
and  the  rate  of  senescence  diminishes  with  age. 

"As  the  corollary  from  these  we  have  this, — natural  death  is 
the  consequence  of  cellular  differentiation." 

Indeed,  as  Dr.  C.  A.  Stephens,^  in  pondering  over 
these  questions,  wrote  : — 

"  When  we  ask  the  question  boldly :  Why  does  the  human 
body  grow  old,  and  at  length  cease  from  function'? — putting  the 
inquiry  in  the  bio-physical  sense,  the  answer  seems  to  be  that 
the  personal  life  embodied  in  the  organism  is  at  length  overcome 
and  overmatched  hy  the  totality  of  the  resistance  to  life  which  it 
encounters,  from  the  embryonic  stage  onwards,  more  especially 
by  the  general  telluric  resistance,  physical,  chemical,  molar,  mole- 
cular, which  the  protoplasmic  molecules  of  the  organism  meet 
with  as  long  as  they  maintain  the  personal  life.  After  adult  age 
is  reached,  they  lose  ground  in  the  struggle,  and  at  last  succumb. 
The  downward  curve  of  the  somatic  cell  has  begun." 

The  physiological  processes  by  which  food  is  reduced, 
comminuted,  corrected   as  to  its  chemical  constituents, 

^  Natural  Salvation,  p.  78, 

E 


146  DEATH 

peptonised,  hepatised,  oxygenated,  and,  in  a  word,  carried 
forward  to  higher  and  higher  stages  of  chemical  instability, 
fit  for  assimilation  by  the  tissue  cells — all  these  processes 
set  up  a  heavy  draught  on  the  collective  animal  life  of 
the  body,  and  necessitate  the  putting  forth  of  energies 
on  the  part  of  all  the  cells  which  cause  an  ever  increas- 
ing deficit  of  potential,  a  growing  debt  from  overwork, 
a  chronic  accumulation  of  the  effects  of  fatigue,  which, 
under  present  conditions,  nmst  sooner  or  later  lead  to 
a  running  down  of  the  cells. 

Under  favourable  conditions  a  cell  may  gain  potential ; 
but  the  severe,  steady  draught  on  cellular  energy  neces- 
sary to  maintain  organic  nutrition,  even  on  the  best  food 
at  present  procurable,  bankrupts  the  collective  energies 
of  the  cells  within  a  century. 

In  one  sense,  therefore,  it  is  our  food  which  brings  us 
to  death's  door — that  is  to  say,  the  exhausting  physiolo- 
gical processes  necessary  to  prepare  it  for  cell  nutrition 
will  in  the  end  work  the  most  perfect  existent  animal 
organism  to  death.^ 

One  of  the  most  ingenious  and  well-worked-out  theories 
of  the  causation  of  old  age  and  natural  death  (and  of 
their  possible  prevention)  is  that  formulated  by  Mr.  C.  A. 
Stephens,  in  his  book  Living  Matter  :  its  Cycle  of  Growth 
and  Decline  in  Animal  Oy^ganisms.  In  this  excellent 
little  book  the  author  has  discussed  the  various  theories 
of  old  age,  and  pretty  effectually  disposed  of  them.  He 
then  advances  one  of  his  own — postulating,  at  the  same 
time,  a  possible  course  of  life  that  would  offset  physical 
death — at  least,  for  a  very  greatly  extended  period.  Nor 
is  the  author  a  fanatic,  as  might  be  supposed.  After 
showing  the  improbability  of  the  current  notion  that 
we   possess  a  given   fund  or   stock  of  vitality  at  birth, 

^  See  several  lengthy  discussions  of  this  point  in   Vitality,  Fasting  and 
Nutrition. 


I 


OLD  AGE:   ITS  SCIENTIFIC  STUDY       147 

which  we  simply  "  Hve  out "  in  a  greater  or  lesser  time, 
according  to  the  kind  of  life  we  lead,  he  goes  on  to 
show  that  there  is  really  no  direct  evidence  that  living 
matter — as  such,  and  per  se — ever  loses  its  power  or 
vitality,  but  rather  that  its  power  of  manifesting  is  inter- 
fered with  as  life  progresses,  for  the  reason  that  it  is 
forced  to  occupy  a  relatively  smaller  proportion  of  the 
whole  space  of  the  vital  economy,  by  reason  of  the  clog- 
ging and  congesting  that  goes  on  with  the  advance  of 
years,  and  with  the  altered  chemical  and  physical  changes 
that  occur  in  the  organism.  Each  fragment  of  "  biogen  " 
(living  matter)  is  as  powerful  as  ever,  in  other  words ; 
only  it  is  slowly  forced  out  by  the  earthy  components 
in  the  body  and  compelled  to  occupy  less  space.  He 
says,  in  part : — 

"...  Life  is  never  qualitatively ^  but  only  quantitatively  dimi- 
nished; or,  in  other  words,  vitality  as  a  physical  process  never 
slackens  from  any  variability  of  its  originating  force — that  force 
being  the  universal  sentience  of  matter,  and  as  constant  as  gravi- 
tation and  the  weight  of  the  earth — and  hence  death  comes  to 
a  person,  not  from  a  decline  of  this  initial  vital  power  itself,  but 
from  those  extrinsic  obstacles  which  befall  from  the  material 
environment  and  from  imperfect  modes  of  living.  ...  It  is  not 
the  sentient  constant  in  '  biogen  '  that  grows  old  in  our  ageing 
organisms,  but  the  surcease  of  the  biogen  from  the  tissues  on 
account  of  mechanical  causes  connected  with  growth  and  the 
product  of  growth.  ...  A  tissue  is  'old'  because  there  is  little 
biogen  in  it,  not  so  much  because  the  biogen  has  grown  intrinsically 
weak." 

Mr.  Stephens  then  enumerates  the  various  chemical 
and  physical  causes  which  constitute  old  age  and  death, 
and  points  out  that  all  these  causes,  being  under- 
stood, might  be  removed ;  and  that  there  is  no  reason, 
therefore,  why  death  should  not  be  postponed  almost 
indefinitely — looked  at  from  the  theoretical  point  of  view. 


148  DEATH 

We  have  elsewhere  dealt  with  this  theory,  and  will  not 
now  discuss  it  further.  His  theory  of  old  age  contains, 
assuredly,  more  than  a  grain  of  truth — in  fact,  is  largely 
true.  All  the  newer  researches  in  cell  activity  and  cell 
life  go  to  show  that  ^9?'02?o?'i^zo?is  are  changed,  but  that 
the  innate  poiuer  of  the  proportions  remains  practically 
constant.  In  other  words,  living  matter  is  living  matter 
everywhere  and  always,  and  its  differences  are  in  degree 
and  not  in  kind.  If  less  of  it  be  present  (owing  to 
obstruction  or  other  causes),  less  of  it  will  be  manifest ; 
and  if  more  of  it  be  present,  more  of  it  will  be  manifest. 
That  is  the  whole  case  in  a  nutshell. 

We  need  hardly  point  out  that  this  is  a  position  which 
some  writers  maintained  for  a  long  time.  In  Vitality, 
Fasting  and  Nutrition,  a  number  of  reasons  for  thinking 
this  to  be  the  correct  view  of  the  case  are  given,  as 
well  as  facts  and  analogies  in  support  of  such  a  con- 
ception. And  we  venture  to  think  that  many  of  the 
difficulties  of  biology  would  cease  to  exist  if  such  a 
view  of  the  facts  were  ever  taken.  It  has  always  re- 
mained a  standing  mystery,  e.g.,  how  an  oak  tree  could 
spring  from  an  acorn ;  how  the  power  and  potentiality 
of  the  immense  tree  could  be  contained  within  the  small 
seed  before  us.  And  yet  that  is  what  we  are  asked 
to  accept !  And  in  a  similar  manner  we  are  asked  to 
believe  that  man,  with  all  his  intellect  and  varied  powers 
— gained,  as  we  know,  by  hard  and  persistent  work 
—  is  potentially  contained  within  the  minute  speck 
of  protoplasm  which  must  be  studied  by  means  of  the 
most  powerful  microscope !  Could  any  fact  be  more 
difficult  of  acceptance  than  this  ? 

We  venture  to  think  that  the  whole  difficulty  would 
vanish  were  we  to  regard  the  facts  from  another  view-point. 
Instead  of  regarding  vitality  and  life  as  a  function  and 
product  of  matter,  regard  the  material  body  as  the  instru- 


OLD  AGE:  ITS  SCIENTIFIC  STUDY       149 

ment    merely    for  the    constant   transmission   through  it 
of   life.     The   greater   the   organism    in    bulk,   and    the 
pm^er  in  composition,   the   more   life  flows   through   it ; 
and  the  lesser  in  bulk  and  the  more  obstructed,  the  less 
life  will  flow  through  it.     This  is  only  what  we  should 
expect  a  jjriori,  and  is  borne  out  by  facts.      On  this  view 
of  the  case,  we  should  not  have  to  believe  that  the  oak 
tree  was  contained  within   the   acorn;   that    the   future 
man  was  contained  within  that  minute  speck  of  proto- 
plasm, and  similar  absurdities  against  which  the    mind 
rebels    as    impossible   on   their  very  face.       We    should 
have  to  believe  merely  that,  as  growth  took  place,  and 
the   organism   increased    in   size,    more    life    manifested 
through   it — only   what   we    should    expect ;    and    that, 
in  proportion  to  the  clogging-up  of  the  organism  (and 
kindred    physical    and    chemical    defects)    the    passage 
through  it  of  life  became  impossible.     We  venture  to 
think  that  many  of  the  knotty  problems  in  biology  might 
vanish,  were  such  a  view  of  the  facts  taken;   were  we 
to  regard  life  as  a  power  and  the  body  as  a  mere  engine 
for    its    transmission — a    sort    of    organic    burning-glass 
through  which  the  life-rays  of  the  universe  are  concen- 
trated and  centred.      And,  just  as  defects  in  or  injury 
to   the  burning-glass  would  impede   and   interfere  with 
the  rays  transmitted,  just  so  would  the  condition  of  the 
organism — its  freedom   from   disease,  &c. — regulate   the 
amount    of    life-force    that    might    flow   through   it   at 
any  particular  moment.     But  the  decomposition  of  the 
body  would   no   more  prove  the  extinction  of  the  life- 
force  than  would  the  breakage  of  the  burning-glass  prove 
the  obliteration  of  the  sun.     In  both  cases  the  instru- 
ment for  transmission  (merely)  has  been  destroyed ;  not 
the  thing  transmitted — the  animating  power  behind  and 
beyond.     But  to  resume  our  theories  of  old  age. 

Few  indeed  are  the  men  and  women  of  full  age — say 


150  DEATH 

twenty-five — who  have  not  yet  contiacted  the  malady 
that  will  kill  them,  according  to  that  distinguished 
scientist  and  physician  Dr.  Felix  Regnault.  Normally, 
as  contemporary  investigators  are  beginning  to  find  out, 
it  takes  twenty  years  for  a  fatal  malady  to  kill  a  patient. 
It  may  take  thirty  years.  The  popular  impression  is 
that  a  man  may  die  suddenly,  or  that  he  may  only 
require  a  year  to  die  in,  or  six  months.  To  be  sure, 
a  man  may  be  killed  or  a  child  may  die  in  a  few  months 
at  the  age  of  one  year.  But  ordinarily  speaking,  all 
deaths  are  very  slow  indeed,  and  about  95  per  cent, 
of  civilised  adults  are  now  stricken  with  a  fatal  disease. 
They  do  not  know  it.  They  may  not  suffer  from  it. 
In  due  time  they  will  have  their  cases  diagnosed  as 
cancer,  or  as  tuberculosis  or  diabetes,  or  what  not.  But 
so  inveterate  are  current  misconceptions  of  the  nature 
of  death  that  the  origin  of  the  fatal  malady — in  time — 
will  be  miscalculated  by  from  ten  to  thirty  years. 

In  the  case  of  human  beings,  explains  Dr.  Regnault, 
writing  in  The  International  (London),  death — barring 
accident — is  nearly  always  caused  by  some  specific 
malady.  This  malady  is  as  likely  as  not  to  be  cured 
— what  is  called  "  cured."  The  ''  cure,"  however,  no 
matter  how  skilful  the  treatment  or  how  slight  the 
disease,  has  left  a  weakness  behind  it  in  some  particular 
organ  of  the  body.  One  of  the  organs  is,  if  not  pre- 
maturely worn  out,  at  least  so  worn  that  its  resisting 
powers  are  greatly  diminished.  All  of  us  in  this  way 
when  we  have  reached  a  certain  age  possess  an  organ 
that  is  much  older  than  the  rest  of  the  physique.  One 
day  we  shall  die  because  of  this  organ.  Even  if  we  live 
to  be  very  old  indeed,  we  shall  not  die  of  "  old  age " 
but  of  weakness  of  the  lungs,  or  of  the  kidneys  or  of 
the  liver  or  of  the  brain.  The  individual  does  not 
die  of  senile  decay,  no  matter  if  he  live  to  be  ninety 


OLD  AGE:   ITS  SCIENTIFIC  STUDY       151 

or  a  hundred.  He  dies  of  the  decay  of  the  lungs,  or 
of  the  decay  of  the  heart,  or  of  the  decay  of  the  kidneys, 
or  of  the  decay  of  some  other  organ.  That  organ  has 
been  dying  for  years.     For  if  there  be  one  truth  more 

\      firmly    established    than   others,  it    is    this :    no   bodily 

\     organ  can   perish  from  disease  in  less  than  ten  years. 

!     Sometimes  it   takes    thirty   years.      Usually   it   requires 

i     twenty  years. 

I  How  is  it  that  one  organ  thus  decays  more  quickly 

than  the  others  ?  Physicians  reply  because  it  has 
suffered  from  the  attacks  of  illnesses.  A  cure  is  never 
absolute.  The  organ  never  comes  out  of  an  illness  in 
exactly  the  same  condition  as  when  it  went  in.  Scarlet 
fever,  for  example,  attacks  a  person.  The  kidneys  have 
been  thereby  affected.  For  ten,  twenty,  or  even  thirty 
years  more  they  may  perform  their  functions  excellently, 
but  nevertheless  they  will  have  an  earlier  senility.  The 
kidney  cells  slowly  perish  at  a  time  when  the  other 
organs  are  still  healthy.  At  the  age  of  fifty  or  sixty 
the  sick  person  is  carried  off.  The  same  holds  true  of 
other  and  very  unimportant  illnesses.  A  man  dies  of 
heart-weakness.  An  old  rheumatic  attack  will  very 
easily  be  detected  as  the  cause.  It  long  seemed  as 
though  it  had  left  no  traces,  but  they  show  themselves 
only  in  the  fatal  illness.  Another  old  man  dies  owing 
to  the  wearing  out  of  the  blood-vessels.  If  the  blood- 
vessels age  more  rapidly  than  the  rest  of  the  body,  it 
is  because  they  have  been  weakened  by  an  infectious 
disease  or  some  form  of  poisoning. 

Take  the  case  of  the  man  who  dies  of  lung  trouble. 
It  is  traceable  to  bronchitis  or  to  slight  tuberculosis 
in  youth,  which  did  not  betray  its  presence  but  yet 
had  weakened  the  organ.  In  all  cases  death  is  to 
be  ascribed  to  an  illness  which  had  attacked  the  in- 
dividual  in  his  youth   and   weakened  an  organ,   or    to 


152  DEATH 

some  infection  which  had  permanently  remained  in 
a  latent  condition.  The  bacteria  which  had  caused 
the  illness  do  not  quit  the  organism  when  the  illness 
is  terminated.  They  await  in  the  interior  of  the  organ 
the  opportunity  for  a  fresh  attack. 

"  Thus  many  men  wlio  are  outwardly  healthy  carry  the  malicious 
enemy  inside  tliem.  A  fever,  caught  in  youth,  returns  after  twenty, 
thirty,  or  fifty  years ;  the  bacillus,  for  example,  of  marsh-fever  has 
been  dormant  the  whole  time,  and  yet  in  old  age  awakens  to  fresh 
and  fatal  activity. 

"To  these  causes  of  the  decay  of  single  organs  may  be  added 
those  which  are  due  to  the  folly  of  the  individual  himself.  Drinkers 
ruin  their  livers,  immoderate  eaters  overload  their  stomachs,  smokers 
weaken  their  hearts  ;  life  ceases  on  the  day  when  these  organs  finally 
refuse  further  service.  We  do  not  die  suddenly;  our  existence 
perishes  gradually  with  the  weakening  of  the  organs.  To  reach  ad- 
vanced old  age,  a  man  must  have  been  healthy  his  whole  life  long." 

This  theory  has  been  criticised  on  the  ground  that 
it  fails  to  take  into  account  the  fact  that  the  body  is 
constantly  rebuilding  its  various  parts,  particularly  its 
diseased  or  broken  parts,  and  hence,  any  innate  weakness 
would  be  eradicated  long  before  it  worked  the  havoc 
here  suggested.  Other  reasons,  too,  might  be  urged 
against  this  theory ;  but  on  the  whole  it  is  doubtless 
sound  in  its  main  contention,  and  is  a  valuable  suggestion 
towards  a  correct  understanding  of  the  causes  of  death 
in  a  large  number  of  cases. 

Very  different,  again,  are  the  views  recently  advanced 
by  Dr.  Arnold  Lorand,  of  Carlsbad,  who  has  just  issued 
an  English  translation  of  his  work,  Old  Age  Deferred. 
According  to  this  theory,  old  age  and  premature  death 
depend,  not  upon  the  age  of  the  arteries,  as  has  been  so 
often  suggested,  but  upon  the  condition  of  the  ductless 
glands.  All  vital  phenomena,  he  says,  are  under  the 
control  of  the  action  of  these  glands  ;  everything  depends 


OLD  AGE:   ITS  SCIENTIFIC  STUDY       153 

upon  their  condition.  Symptoms  of  old  age  appear  after 
changes  in  these  glands.  The  appearance,  the  condition 
of  the  tissues,  all  depend  upon  their  condition.  Depress- 
ing emotions  are,  perhaps,  the  most  fatal  and  certain  of 
all  means  of  breaking  down  these  organs,  and  insuring 
premature  old  age  and  death.  To  summarise  this  author's 
views  in  his  own  words : — 

"The  symptoms  of  old  age  are  the  result  of  breakdown  of  the 
tissues  and  organs  which,  owing  to  shrinking  of  the  blood-vessels, 
are  insufficiently  suppKed  with  blood,  and,  owing  to  the  disappear- 
ance of  nervous  elements,  are  devoid  of  proper  nervous  control. 

"Degeneration  of  the  ductless  glands  and  of  the  organs  and 
tissues  cannot  be  simultaneous,  for  the  latter  are  under  the 
control  of  the  former.  These  glands  govern  the  processes  of 
metabolism  and  nutrition  of  the  tissues,  and  by  their  incessant 
antitoxic  action  protect  the  organism  from  the  numerous  poisonous 
products,  be  they  of  exogenous  origin,  introduced  with  air  or  food, 
or  endogenous,  formed  as  waste  products  during  vital  processes- 
After  degeneration  of  these  glands  the  processes  of  metabolism  in 
the  tissues  are  diminished,  and  there  is  an  increase  of  fibrous  tissue 
at  the  expense  of  more  highly  differentiated  structures. 

"The  fact  that  the  changes  in  the  tissues  are  secondary  and 
take  place  only  after  primary  changes  in  the  ductless  glands,  is 
best  proved  by  the  circumstances  that  they  can  be  produced,  either 
experimentally  by  the  extirpation  of  certain  of  the  ductless  glands, 
or  spontaneously  by  the  degeneration  of  these  glands  in  disease. 

"  It  is  evident  from  the  above  considerations  that  all  hygienic 
errors,  be  they  errors  of  diet  or  any  kind  of  excess,  will  bring 
about  their  own  punishment ;  and  that  premature  old  age,  or  a 
shortened  life,  will  be  the  result.  In  fact,  it  is  mainly  our 
own  fault  if  we  become  senile  at  sixty  or  seventy,  and  die  before 
ninety  or  a  hundred. 

"  Not  only  old  age,  but  the  majority  of  diseases,  are  due  to 
our  own  fault  in  undermining  our  natural  immunity  against 
infections,  and  subjecting  our  various  organs  to  unreasonable 
overwork  and  exertion.  We  do  not  believe  that  the  worst  slave- 
driver  of  olden  days  subjected  his  slaves  to  such  treatment  as 


154  DEATH 

we  do  our  own  organs,  and  especially  our  nerves.  At  last  they 
must  rebel,  and  disease,  with  early  death  or  premature  old  age, 
will  be  the  result. 

"It  is  literally  true,  as  the  German  proverb  says :  'Jederist 
seines  Gliickes  Schmied '  (every  man  is  the  locksmith  of  his  own 
happiness),  and  as  a  variation  on  this  we  would  say  :  '  Every  man 
is  the  guardian  of  his  own  health.' " 

Of  recent  years.  Professor  Metchnikoff  has  devoted 
considerable  time  and  energy  to  this  question  of  "  old 
age,"  and  discusses  the  subject  fairly  and  fully  in  his 
Old  Age,  mentioned  above,  in  his  New  Hygiene,  his 
Nature  of  Man,  and  his  Prolongation  of  Life.  His  posi- 
tion throughout  all  his  writings  remains  the  same,  and 
can  best  be  summed  up  in  his  own  words  as  follows : — 

"...  I  think  I  am  justified  in  asserting  that  senile  decay 
is  mainly  due  to  the  destruction  of  the  higher  elements  of  the 
organism  by  macrophags.  .  .  .  Since  the  mechanism  of  senile 
atrophy  is  entirely  similar  to  that  of  atrophies  of  microbic  or  toxic 
origin,  it  may  be  asked  whether  in  old  age  there  may  not  be  some 
intervention  of  microbes  or  their  poisons.  .  .  .  The  principal 
phenomena  of  old  age  depend  upon  the  indirect  action  of  microbes 
that  become  collected  in  our  digestive  tube.  ...  It  is  really 
intestinal  microbes  that  are  the  cause  of  our  senile  atrophy.  .  .  . 
Old  age  is  an  infectious  chronic  disease  which  is  manifested  by  a 
degeneration,  or  an  enfeebling  of  the  nobler  elements,  and  by  the 
excessive  activity  of  the  macrophags.  These  modifications  cause 
a  disturbance  of  the  equilibrium  of  the  cells  composing  our  body, 
and  set  up  a  struggle  within  our  organism  which  ends  in  a  pre- 
cocious ageing  and  in  premature  death,  contrary  to  nature." 

Accordingly,  M.  Metchnikoff  seeks  means  to  destroy 
these  invading  microbes.  He  thinks  that  he  has  found 
the  remedy,  in  part  at  least,  in  the  free  use  of  lactic 
acid,  which  kills  the  organisms  and  renders  their  growth 
and  presence  impossible.  Doubtless  this  method  would 
dispose   of  the   micro-organisms  then   in    the   intestinal 


OLD  AGE:  ITS  SCIENTIFIC  STUDY       155 

tube ;  but  what  if  more  are  introduced  ?  We  must 
drink  more  of  his  soured  milk,  containing  lactic  acid  ! 
But  is  it  not  obvious  that  this  is  merely  tinkering  at 
effects,  instead  of  going  direct  to  the  root  and  cause  of 
the  evil  ?  ^  Why  not  render  the  soil  such  that  no 
microbes  can  live  in  it,  in  the  first  place,  and  then  no 
lactic  acid  treatment  or  other  measures  of  a  similar 
nature  would  be  necessary  ?  M.  Metchnikoff  is  forced  to 
admit  that,  if  the  bowel  were  perfectly  healthy,  there 
would  and  could  be  no  auto-intoxication,  and  hence  no 
degeneration  of  the  nature  indicated.  Why  not,  then, 
aim  at  preserving  the  bowel  in  such  a  state  of  cleanli- 
ness and  in  such  an  antiseptic  condition  that  no  micro- 
organisms could  possibly  dwell  therein  ?  Should  not 
that  be  our  ideal  ? 

M.  Metchnikoff  practically  admits  this  in  several 
passages  in  his  works ;  but  his  method  of  preserving 
such  a  state  is  very  different  from  one  that  would  be 
recommended  by  any  hygienic  physician.  He  contends 
that  we  should  never  eat  raw  food,  or  food  that  has  not 
been  thoroughly  cooked,  as  we  are  liable  thereby  to 
introduce  germs  into  the  intestinal  canal !  All  water 
should  be  boiled ;  everything  sterilised — every  precau- 
tion taken  to  prevent  the  introduction  into  the  body  of 
micro-organisms,  which  he  so  greatly  fears.  He  says 
nothing  of  the  air,  so  we  must  assume  that  that  is 
not  sterilised  !  M.  Metchnikoff  believes  that  cancer  is 
produced  by  micro-organisms,  and  asserts  that  he  has 

^  Says  Professor  Charles  Minot  on  this  point: — "It  is  unquestionable 
that  phagocytes  do  eat  up  fragments  of  cells  and  of  tissues,  and  may 
even  attack  whole  cells.  But  to  me  it  seems  probable  that  their  role  is 
entirely  secondary.  They  do  not  cause  the  death  of  cells,  but  they  feed 
presumably  upon  cells  which  are  already  dead  or  at  least  dying.  Their 
activity  is  to  be  regarded,  so  far  as  the  problem  of  the  death  of  cells  is 
concerned,  not  as  indicating  the  cause  of  death,  but  as  a  phenomenon 
for  the  display  of  which  the  death  of  the  cell  offers  an  opportunity." — 
Age,  Growth  and  Death,  p.  74.     (See  Appendix  F.) 


156  DEATH 

eaten  only  cooked  foods  for  many  years,  in  an  attempt 
to  escape  that  terrible  malady. 

[In  opposition  to  this  view,  I  may  state  that  there  are 
many  persons — whole  colonies  of  them  in  California — who 
eat  nothing  hut  raw  fruits  and  nuts,  and  who  never  boil 
their  water,  or  cook  their  food  at  all — and  they  never  suffer 
from  any  of  these  dread  complaints,  but  are,  on  the  con- 
trary, exceptionally  healthy  and  robust  and  long-lived. 
Professor  Jaffa,  who  made  a  special  study  of  these 
"  fruitarians,"  found  them  to  be  especially  healthy  and 
possessed  of  an  abundance  of  energy.^  And  all  of  these 
men  and  women  live  far  longer  than  the  average,  and  are 
almost  entirely  free  from  the  numerous  diseases  and  com- 
plaints from  which  humanity  suffers.     How  is  this  ? 

The  answer  is  simple  enough.  As  I  have  already 
pointed  out  in  another  place,  it  is  not  the  germ  that  is 
to  be  dreaded,  but  that  condition  of  the  body  which 
renders  possible  the  presence  and  growth  of  that  germ  ! 
If  the  body  were  healthy,  no  germs  could  live  in  such 
an  organism,  no  matter  how  many  were  introduced — 
they  would  be  instantly  killed,  and  they  could  not  exist 
therein  for  an  instant.  We  need  not  bother  about  the 
germs ;  keep  the  body  sound,  well,  strong,  and  full  of 
energy,  and  nature  will  take  care  of  the  rest — including 
the  germs  !  They  are  quite  incapable  of  doing  any 
harm  in  a  healthy  body.  The  sounder  the  body  the 
less  danger  of  infection,  and  the  longer  and  the  healthier 
the  life.  Now,  as  fruitarianism,  or  the  practice  of  living 
upon  fruits,  is  one  of  the  best  possible  means  of  keeping 
the  body  in  this  desirable  condition,  it  will  readily  be 
seen  that,  if  we  live  on  raw  fruit,  and  those  simple  foods 
that  tend  to  keep  the  body  in  the  best  possible  health ; 
and  if  we  are  careful,  at  the  same  time,  not  to  eat  too 

^  See  his  Investigations  among  Fruitarians,  U.S.  Dept.  of  Agr.  Report. 


OLD  AGE:  ITS  SCIENTIFIC  STUDY       157 

much,  we  shall  keep  the  intestinal  canal  free  from  all 
obnoxious  microbes — for  the  simple  reason  that  their 
growth  and  presence  there  would  be  an  utter  impossi- 
bility. No  matter  if  we  do  introduce  into  it  such 
micro-organisms  with  the  food,  the  body  would  speedily 
dispose  of  them.  The  state  of  the  body  is  everything ; 
the  number  of  microbes  introduced  of  very  small 
moment.  Eat  those  foods,  therefore,  that  keep  the  body 
in  the  best  possible  health,  and  do  not  worry  in  the 
least  about  the  micro-organisms,  that  may  or  may  not 
exist  in  the  intestines.  They  will  soon  be  disposed  of. 
The  food  is  the  all-important  factor ;  and  fruit — man's 
natural  food — should  be  eaten  almost  exclusively  if  we 
wish  to  avoid  old  age,  premature  death,  and  all  the  ills 
that  exist  before  both  these  conditions.  It  will  thus 
be  seen  that  I  have  been  forced  to  agree  with  Drs. 
Bostwick  and  Evans,  previously  mentioned,  as  this  was 
their  contention  precisely.  M.  MetchnikofP  has  failed  to 
make  sufficient  allowance  for  the  germicidal  and  anti- 
septic properties  of  the  body,  when  maintained  in  the  lest 
of  health  hy  means  of  natural,  uncooked  foods.  He  has 
studied  the  effects  of  these  micro-organisms  upon  bodies 
badly  nourished  with  cooked  food,  and  food  more  or  less 
diseased.  Let  him  study  bodies  nourished  and  main- 
tained by  their  natural  food— fruits  and  nuts,  in  their 
uncooked,  primitive  form — and  then  report  the  results ! 
There  can  be  no  doubt  that  M.  Metchnikoff  will  have  to 
materially  alter  his  theories  as  to  the  causation  of  old 
age  and  natural  death,  and  will  be  forced  to  the  con- 
clusion that,  after  all,  these  states  are  caused  by  the 
running  down  of  the  vital  forces  in  consequence  of 
the  altered  chemical  condition  of  the  body,  and  of  its 
blockage  by  mal-assimilated  food-material !  These  ideas 
will,  however,  be  elaborated  further  on,  in  our  discussion 
of  the  causes  of  natural  death. — H.  C] 


CHAPTER   VIII 

THE   QUESTIONNAIRE  ON   DEATH— ANSWERS 

Having  failed  to  derive  any  satisfactory  explanation  of 
death  from  the  literature  upon  the  subject  and  from 
historic  research,  it  occurred  to  us  to  sound  the  opinion 
of  the  scientific  world  at  the  present  time,  and  endeavour 
to  ascertain,  if  possible,  the  opinions  of  a  number  of 
eminent  scientists,  philosophers,  and  others  entitled  to 
a  hearing  upon  this  question.  By  doing  so  we  hoped  to 
arrive  at  some  more  definite  conclusion  as  to  the  real 
nature  of  this  mysterious  process,  so  fancifully  and  so 
inaccurately  described  by  the  majority  of  writers  in  the 
past.  It  is  true  that  various  speculations  have  been 
advanced  from  time  to  time  by  writers  upon  this  subject, 
some  of  which  are  certainly  ingenious  and  well  worthy 
of  the  most  serious  consideration.  Yet,  objections  to  the 
theories  may  be  found  in  almost  every  case.  We  shall 
return  to  this  presently.  Certain  it  is  that  the  scientific 
world  as  a  whole  has  arrived  at  no  definite  conception  of 
the  process,  and  the  attitude  of  the  majority  of  men 
might  perhaps  be  expressed  in  the  following  significant 
extract.  Professor  Joseph  Le  ContC;  writing  in  Balfour 
Stewart's  Consei-vation  of  Energy,  says  : — 

"...  But  death?  Can  we  detect  anything  returned  to  the 
forces  of  nature  by  simple  death?  What  is  the  nature  of  the 
difference  between  the  living  organism  and  a  dead  organism  ?  We 
can  detect  none,  physical  or  chemical.  All  the  physical  and 
chemical  forces  withdrawn  from  the  common  fund  of  nature  and 
embodied  in  the  living  organism  seem  to  be  still  embodied  in  the 

158 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS     159 

dead,  until  little  by  little  it  is  returned  by  decomposition.  Yet  the 
difference  is  immense,  is  inconceivably  great !  What  is  the  nature 
of  this  difference  expressed  in  the  formula  of  material  science? 
What  is  it  that  is  gone,  and  whither  is  it  gone  ?  There  is  some- 
thing here  which  science  cannot  understand.  Yet  it  is  just  that 
loss  which  takes  place  in  death  and  before  decomposition,  which 
is  in  the  highest  sense  vital  force"  (pp.  200-1). 

In  order  to  arrive,  if  possible,  at  some  definite  conclu- 
sion in  the  matter,  therefore,  we  devised  and  sent  to  a 
number  of  men  whose  opinion  would  be  well  worth  hear- 
ing, a  circular  letter  asking  the  following  question : — 

"  What  do  you  consider  to  be  the  real  nature  of 
DEATH  ?  (  JVe  mean  hy  this,  of  course,  nahtral  death  ; 
and  not  death  due  to  disease,  accident,  or  other  causes 
of  a  like  nature.)  " 

We  received  a  number  of  most  interesting  answers  to 
this  question  from  men  and  women  of  various  types 
of  mind — some  of  which  we  give  below.  Not  the  least 
interesting  and  significant  fact  elicited  by  our  inquiry, 
however,  is  that  it  showed  an  almost  complete  lack  of 
previous  thought  on  the  subject !  It  is  astonishing  to 
find  the  complete  indifference  that  is  manifested,  not 
only  by  the  public  but  also  by  scientists,  on  this  subject 
of  death.  Eloquent  testimony  of  this  is  evidenced  by 
the  fact  that  so  little  has  been  written  about  the  sub- 
ject; and  in  talking  to  any  one  about  it  one  soon  finds 
that  he  displays  the  completest  indifference  to  the  whole 
question  !  \  Things  of  real  worth,  such  as  the  mental  life 
of  the  ant  or  the  crab,  fill  psychological  and  scientific 
literature ;  but  such  a  thing  as  death,  which  involves  the 
whole  human  race  more  intimately  than  anything  else 
possibly  can — since  all  must  die — is  regarded  as  hardly 
worthy  of  serious  discussion  !  )  Professor  F.  C.  S.  Schiller 
showed  the  complete  lack  of  interest  of  the  public  in 
the  question  of  immortality  in  his  statistical  inquiry  con- 


160  DEATH 

ducted  some  years  ago,  the  results  of  which  were  printed 
in  the  Proceedings  of  the  Society  for  Psychical  Research, 
vol.  xviii.  pp.  416-53.  A  similar  indifference  as  to  the 
subject  of  death  was  pointed  out  and  insisted  upon  by 
Mr.  Joseph  Jacobs  in  his  little  booklet  Tlie  Dying  of  Death. 
Perhaps  we  can  best  illustrate  this  lack  of  interest  in  the 
subject  by  the  following  letter,  which  we  quote  verbatim, 
omitting:  the  name  in  order  to  save  the  feelino^s  of  the 
writer.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  the  author  of  this  letter  is  a 
well-known — in  fact  quite  a  famous — physician,  to  whom 
we  had  written,  asking  him  to  state  his  views  as  to  the 
nature  of  death.  If  any  one  ought  to  take  an  active 
and  intense  interest  in  this  subject,  surely  that  man  ought 
to  be  the  physician,  and  yet  this  is  what  he  wrote  in 
answer  to  our  question  : — 

Dear  Sir, — .  .  .  I  do  not  take  the  slightest  interest  in  either 
the  physiological  or  psychological  aspects  of  the  death  question. 
Metchnikoff,  however,  has  considerable  to  say  on  the  subject.  I 
have  no  theories  as  to  the  cause  of  natural  death,  nor,  in  fact,  on 
any  other  subject. — Yours  very  truly,  . 

Metchnikoff  and  others  have  insisted  over  and  over 
again  that  old  age  is  a  pathological  process,  and  that 
death  is  also  due  to  certain  obscure  physiological  and 
pathological  causes  and  processes.  All  sickness  bears 
the  very  closest  resemblance  to  these  processes,  therefore, 
and  will  frequently  terminate  in  death  if  not  properly 
treated.  And  yet  here  is  a  man  who  professes  "  not  the 
slightest  interest  "  in  any  of  these  vital  questions !  Is 
this  not  tantamount  to  admitting  that,  although  his 
practice  may  bring  him  in  a  good  living,  he  has  not  the 
slightest  intellectual  interest  in  any  of  the  philosophical 
questions  that  underlie  his  work  and  render  it  of  use 
and  benefit  to  the  world  ? 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS     161 

We  regret  to  say  that  this  same  attitude  has  been 
taken  by  other  men  who,  one  would  think,  should  take  a 
special  interest  in  this  question,  bearing,  as  it  does,  upon 
the  work  that  forms  their  most  important  life-study. 
The  following  letter  is  an  example  of  this  :— 

From  Professor  James  H.  Hyslop,  Ph.D.,  LL.D.,  New  York,  U.S.A. 

My  dear  Mr.  Carrington, — lu  reply  to  your  inquiry  about 
my  opinion  of  death,  I  can  only  say  that  I  have  no  theory  or  con- 
ception of  it  whatever.  I  have  never  bothered  my  head  about  its 
nature  for  five  minutes.  I  really  do  not  know,  and  do  not  care,  what 
it  is.  The  cessation  of  life  is  all  I  know  or  believe  about  it. — 
Very  sincerely,  James  H.  Hyslop. 

It  is  remarkable  that  such  a  stand  should  be  taken  by 
this  investigator,  since  the  whole  question  of  psychic 
research  hinges  about  the  point  of  death,  and  whether 
life  persists  after  it  or  not.  Inasmuch  as  Dr.  Hyslop 
believes  in  the  persistence  of  consciousness  after  death — 
or  "  the  spiritistic  hypothesis  " — it  is  certainly  an  inaccu- 
racy on  his  part  to  say  or  infer  that  the  "  cessation  of  life  " 
is  the  chief  factor  of  death.  Further,  a  man  who  devotes 
his  whole  life  to  the  study  of  psychic  problems  should 
certainly,  of  all  others,  be  most  vitally  and  fundamentally 
interested  in  this  question,  since  much  depends  upon  the 
interpretation  given  to  the  phenomenon  called  death. 
We  prefer  to  think  that  this  letter  represents  the  hastily 
expressed  view  of  this  authority  rather  than  his  carefully- 
worded  opinion  of  "  the  real  nature  "  of  the  process. 

A  letter  of  somewhat  similar  type,  though  more 
cautious,  is  that  of  Dr.  James  J.  Putnam,  the  well-known 
neurologist,  whose  letter  follows  : — 

Fro7n  Dr.  James  J.  Putnam,  Boston,  Mass. 

My  dear  Sir, — I  have  no  special  ideas  to  express  upon  the  sub- 
ject of  death. — Yours  truly,  James  J.  Putnam. 

L 


162  DEATH 

One  curious  fact  elicited  by  our  circular  letter  is 
that  so  many  men  expressed  their  complete  ignorance 
of  the  subject,  and,  what  is  still  more  curious,  stated 
that  they  had,  so  far,  never  had  time  to  think  seriously 
upon  it  1  One  sample  letter  of  this  kind  may  be  of 
interest : — 

From  Nikola  Tesla,  New  York,  U.S.A. 

Dear  Sir, — Replying  to  your  favour  of  the  16th  inst.,  I  agree 
with  you  that  the  subject  is  most  interesting.  But  to  express 
myself  in  regard  to  it  would  require  a  concentration  of  thought 
which,  in  the  midst  of  my  present  labours,  is  impossible  for  me. 

Regretting  my  inability,  and  thanking  you  for  your  courtesy,  I 
remain.  Very  truly  yours,  N.  Tesla. 

Astonishment  at  the  lack  of  interest  in  this  question 
is  expressed  by  one  or  two  of  our  correspondents  who 
have  thought  and  written  upon  these  subjects.  Thus, 
Professor  Schiller  writes  : — 

From  Professor  F.  C.  S.  Schiller,  Oxford,  England. 

Corpus  Christi  College,  Oxford. 

Dear  Sir, — In  reply  to  your  inquiry  about  death,  I  can  only 
repeat  the  commonplace,  that.  Death  is  a  mystery.  Two  aspects 
of  this  mystery  have,  however,  always  excited  my  astonishment, — 
the  one  physiological,  the  other  psychological. 

The  physiological  mystery  consists  in  the  fact  that  the  body, 
being  a  machine  which  has  somehow  learned  to  repair  itself, 
should  not  continue  to  do  so  indefinitely.  The  psychological 
mystery  consists  in  the  fact  that  people  manage  to  think  so  little 
about  death,  and  to  care  so  little  about  what  happens  to  them  in 
that  crisis.  For  the  rest,  I  may  refer  those  desirous  of  speculating 
upon  the  subject  to  Riddles  of  the  Sphinx  (Ch.  xi.),  Humanism 
(Ch.  xiii.-xv.),  and  Studies  of  Humanism  (Ch.  xvii.). — I  remain, 
yours  truly,  F.  C.  S.  Schiller,  M.A.,  D.Sc, 

Fellow  and  Tutor,  Corpus  Christi  College,  Oxford. 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS     163 

One  or  two  of  our  correspondents  were  rather  more 
naive  in  their  expressions  of  ignorance  as  to  the  cause 
of  natural  death  ;  one  writer,  for  instance,  expressing  him- 
self as  follows : — 

From  Horace  Fletcher,  Esq.,  Neiu  York,  U.S.A. 

Dear  Sir, — The  real  nature  of  death  is  as  obscure  to  me  as  is  the 
real  nature  of  life  itself. 

I  am  enjoying  life  immensely,  and  more  immensely  the  more  I 
learn  to  get  pleasure  of  the  constructive  sort  out  of  it. 

If  the  span  which  is  now  revealed  to  us  is  all  there  is  of  it  for 
our  present  consciousness,  I  am  enormously  glad  I  have  inherited 
it,  and  I  shall  esteem  it  all  clear  profit  in  advance  of  losing  con- 
sciousness— a  sort  of  "  thanking  you  in  advance,"  with  a  return 
stamp  attached  for  autograph  reply. 

If  there  is  persistence  of  this  same  consciousness  beyond  the 
curtain  called  death,  I  feel  quite  certain  that  it  will  be  evolutionary 
in  character.  I  am  sure  to  be  more  comfortable  as  gas  or  ether 
than  when  compelled  to  wear  fashionable  clothing. 

For  my  best  pleasure  of  thinking  I  accept  the  common  idealism 
which  gives  human  souls  persistence  of  existence,  and  to  the  souls 
who  gave  me  this  blessed  life  I  delight  to  attribute  all  of  the  direction 
of  my  energies  which  I  know  would  give  them  pleasure  were  they 
still  here  to  express  it. 

However ;  sufficient  unto  the  day  is  the  opportunity  thereof,  and  to 
make  the  most  of  passing  opportunities,  to  do  good  and  gain  pleasure 
thereby,  is  my  most  important  business  oT  the  moment. — Optimis- 
tically yours  until  death  and  forever  thereafter, 

Horace  Fletcher. 

Apparent  hopelessness  of  ever  finding  a  rational  solu- 
tion of  this  problem  is  expressed  in  the  following  letter 
from  an  eminent  Dutch  physician : — 

From  Frederick  van  Eeden,  M.D.,  Holland. 

Dear  Sir, — As  you  ask  me  to  answer  your  question  as  a  scien- 
tific man,   you  will  excuse  me  for  being  rather  scrupulous  and 


164  DEATH 

precise  in  my  answer.  Nobody  can  say  what  something  is.  We 
can  only  express  a  fact  in  different  terms.  A  scientific  answer 
cannot  be  given  before  we  agree  entirely  upon  the  meaning  and 
significance  of  all  the  terms  of  a  question.  What  do  you  mean  by 
"the  real  nature  of  death"?  And  how  can  I  say  tvhat  I  consider 
this  to  be  ?  Death  is  a  very  well  known  fact.  Has  it  something 
which  you  call  its  "  real  nature  "  and  which  cannot  be  expressed  in 
terms  more  familiar,  standing  for  better  known  facts,  so  that  we  feel 
that  the  thing  itself  is  now  clearer  to  us,  is  now  explained  ? 

You  will  get  many  answers  which  seem  to  the  point.  But  these 
answers  will  all  be  more  or  less  poetical,  fanciful,  and  metaphorical. 
Death  will  be  called  a  Birth,  an  Extinction,  a  Sleep,  a  Transition. 
All  this  is  more  or  less  metaphor.  Now  metaphorical  language  is 
poetical  language,  and  not  strictly  scientific.  The  great  poets  have 
said  more  true  and  beautiful  things  about  death  than  any  of  us  can 
do  now.  But  it  is  Science  you  want,  and  Science  can  give  you  only 
the  bare  observations,  and  can  tell  you  nothing  about  what  you 
call  their  "  real  nature "  and  what  I  should  probably  call  their 
significance. 

Yet  it  is  possible  to  give  you  a  somewhat  more  satisfactory  reply 
by  saying,  that  the  well  known  fact.  Death,  can  also  be  expressed 
in  these  terms :  a  profound  and  simultaneous  change  leading  to 
disintegration,  in  all  the  directly  perceptible  elements  of  what  tee 
used  to  call  a  living  entity  (man,  animal,  plant,  or  part  of  plant). 
This  is  only  a  definition,  but  it  excludes  many  prevalent  errors. 
To  say  that  this  change  is  a  total  disintegration  would  be  more 
than  exact  science  can  allow,  because  we  cannot  have  a  clear  and 
complete  knowledge  of  the  former  integrity.  But  most  imjDortant 
of  all,  a  correct  definition  can  only  speak  of  the  directly  (i.e.  sen- 
sorially)  perceptible  elements.  The  extreme  limitation  of  our 
perceptive  (sensorial)  powers  makes  it  highly  probable  that  the 
unperceptible  part  (commonly  called  the  Soul)  of  every  living 
entity  far  excels  its  perceptible  part  (the  body).  And  that  this 
larger  part  may  remain  untouched  by  the  said  apparent  disintegra- 
tion is  a  possibility,  even  a  probability,  acceptable  to  what  I 
consider  a  sound  scientific  judgment. — I  am,  dear  Sir,  yours  very 
truly,  F.  VAN  Eeden. 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS     165 

In  spite  of  Dr.  van  Eeden's  extreme  accuracy  of 
statement,  Ave  cannot  feel  that  he  has  supplied  us  with 
an  exact  definition  of  death.  Dr.  van  Eeden,  it  will  be 
observed,  limits  the  "  profound  and  simultaneous  change  " 
to  the  directly  ;pcrce23tiUe  parts  or  elements  of  the  body. 
But  we  think  that  there  is  no  evidence  whatever  that 
death  may  not  be  due  to  the  action  of  some  purely  im- 
perceptible parts,  or  to  some  non-material  elements 
altogether.  It  may  be  due  to  the  disturbance  of  the 
body's  vital  energy  ;  to  modifications  or  chemical  changes 
in  one  particular  point  or  spot  of  the  cerebral  cortex, 
which  would  not  involve  the  whole  body,  but  which 
might  be  called  a  purely  "  local "  action.  Dr.  van 
Eeden  says  that  this  change  takes  place  in  "  Avhat 
we  used  to  call  a  living  entity,"  which  infers  that  this 
entity  or  body  is  now  dead.  Unless  we  completely 
change  our  conception  of  death,  however,  we  cannot 
agree  that  this  is  in  any  way  a  definition,  since,  it 
will  be  observed,  it  practically  states  that  death  occurs 
in  a  dead  body,  whereas  it  occurs  in  a  living  body, 
and  the  change  is  supposedly  the  cause  of  death.  We 
cannot  see,  therefore,  that  Dr.  van  Eeden  has  supplied 
us  with  a  definition  of  death  that  can  be  said  to  fulfil 
all  of  the  fundamental  requirements  necessary  for  a 
satisfactory  explanation. 

The  following  letter  is  from  Professor  Charles  S. 
Minot : — 

Hakvard  Medical  School, 

Boston,  Mass., 

Jan.  31,  1910. 

My  dear  Sir, — I  have  received  your  circular  of  Jan.  25th. 
My  views  on  the  subject  of  death,  so  far  as  they  can  be  formulated, 
are  recorded  in  my  work.  Age,  Groivth  and  Death, ^  pubHshed  by 

^  Quotations  from  this  book  will  be  found  elsewhere  in  this  volume. 


166  DEATH 

Putnam's,  in  New  York.      You   v:i\\  find  in   this   ])Ook  all   the 
information  I  can  give  you. — Yours  truly, 

Charles  S.  Minot. 

Dr.  Minot's  theory  of  death  should  be  recorded  in  this 
place,  as  he  is  an  author  who  has  given  long  and  serious 
attention  to  this  question  of  death.  Writing  in  Age, 
Growth  and  Death,  pp.  214,  215,  he  says: — 

"  Death  is  not  a  universal  accompaniment  of  life.  In  many  of 
the  lower  organisms  death  does  not  occur,  so  far  as  we  at  present 
know,  as  a  natural  and  necessary  result  of  life.  Death  with  them 
is  purely  the  result  of  an  accident,  some  external  cause.  Our 
existing  science  leads  us,  therefore,  to  the  conception  that  natural 
death  has  been  acquired  during  the  process  of  evolution  of  living 
organisms.  Why  should  it  have  been  acquired?  You  will,  I 
think,  readily  answer  this  question,  if  you  hold  that  the  views 
which  I  have  been  bringing  before  you  have  been  well  defended, 
by  saying  that  it  is  due  to  differentiation,  that  when  the  cells 
acquire  the  additional  faculty  of  passing  beyond  the  simple  stage  to 
the  more  complicated  organisation,  they  lose  some  of  their  vitality, 
some  of  their  power  of  growth,  some  of  their  possibilities  of  per- 
petuation ;  and  as  the  organisation  in  the  process  of  evolution 
becomes  higher  and  higher,  the  necessity  for  change  becomes  more 
and  more  imperative.  But  it  involves  the  end.  Differentiation 
leads,  as  its  inevitable  conclusion,  to  death.  Death  is  the  price 
we  are  obliged  to  pay  for  our  organisation,  for  the  differentiation 
which  exists  in  us.  Is  it  too  high  a  price  1  To  that  organisation 
we  are  indebted  for  the  great  array  of  faculties  with  which  we  are 
endowed.  To  it  we  are  indebted  for  the  means  of  appreciating 
the  sort  of  world,  the  kind  of  universe,  in  which  we  are  placed. 
...  It  does  not  seem  to  me  too  much  for  us  to  pay.  We  accept 
the  price.  .  .  .  Death  of  the  whole  comes,  as  we  now  know, 
whenever  some  essential  part  of  the  body  gives  way — sometimes 
one,  sometimes  another ;  perhaps  the  brain,  perhaps  the  heart, 
perhaps  one  of  the  other  internal  organs  may  be  the  first  in  which 
the  change  of  cytomorphosis  goes  so  far  that  it  can  no  longer 
perform  its  share  of  work,  and,  failing,  brings  about  the  failure  of 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS     167 

the  whole.  This  is  the  scientific  view  of  death.  It  leaves  death 
with  all  its  mystery,  with  all  its  sacredness ;  we  are  not  in  the 
least  able  to  the  present  time  to  say  what  life  is — still  less,  per- 
haps, what  death  is.  We  say  of  certain  things — they  are  alive ; 
of  certain  others — they  are  dead  ;  but  what  the  difference  may  be, 
what  is  essential  to  those  two  states,  science  is  utterly  unable  to 
tell  us  at  the  present  time.  It  is  a  phenomenon  with  which  we 
are  so  familiar  that  perhaps  we  do  not  think  enough  about  it." 

In  the  following  letter  from  Professor  Max  Dessoir, 
some  points  of  great  interest  are  raised.  As,  however, 
Professor  Dessoir  treats  the  question  from  the  philo- 
sophical and  psychological  points  of  view,  rather  than 
from  the  biological  standpoint,  it  is  evident  that  his  letter 
requires  no  extended  criticism  in  this  place.  It  reads  as 
follows : — 

Beklin,  W.  Goltzste.  31, 
Feb.  17,  1910. 

My  dear  Mr.  Carrington, — If  I  understand  your  question 
as  to  the  nature  of  death  to  mean  the  signification  of  that  event, 
I  should,  as  a  philosopher,  reply  as  follows  : — 

I  see  in  death  a  universal  and  sublime  law.  The  thought  that 
men  and  animals  cannot  continue  in  their  life-form — as  known  to 
us — is  to  me  unbearable ;  and  the  certainty  that  no  one  is  an 
exception  to  the  law  is  at  least  gratifying.  The  meaning  of  death 
lies  also  in  this  :  that  all  the  organic  forms  of  being,  not  excepting 
the  highest,  bear  upon  them  the  seal  of  their  own  doom !  And 
this  has  also  a  far  wider  meaning.  With  every  man  who  dies 
goes,  not  only  his  personality,  but  also  the  world  which  he  has 
imagined,  and  which  only  he  possesses — a  world  of  thoughtful 
ideals — memories,  creative  conceptions,  and  so  forth.  Every  death 
means,  therefore,  the  death  of  that  man's  inner  reality.  So  many 
men  die  :  so  many  worlds  are  thus  annihilated  ! 

Another  question  is  whether  immortality  exists  under  change 
of  form,  or  whether  death  changes  the  appearance,  but  leaves  the 
being  of  man  untouched.  If  the  being  and  appearance  are  as 
closely  related  as  is  certainly  the  case  with  man,  he  will  continue 


168  DEATH 

to  imagine  a  continuation  of  personal  identity  in  that  form.     It  is, 
to  him,  a  scientific  probability.  .  .  . 

Still  one  more  thought.  We  know  that  one  of  the  things 
taught  by  hypnotism  and  psychopathology  is  this :  In  some  cases 
when  in  this  condition,  a  larger  personality  is  exhibited.  One 
need  only  remember  Janet's  Felida  X.,  or  Miss  Beauchamp,  tfcc. 
Which  of  these  iDersonalities  shall  exist  after  death?  This  same 
question  holds  good  for  normal  man — though  in  a  lesser  degree. 
We  all  have  passed  through  many  changes — have  been  young  and 
old,  gay  and  sad,  good  and  bad,  heroic  and  cowardly.  And  of  all 
these  characteristics,  shall  only  those  particular  ones  live  further 
which  exist  at  the  accidental  moment  of  death  1  Immortality  in  its 
highest  sense  includes  the  contents  of  all  these  moments ;  and  yet 
we  cannot  conceive  this  to  be  the  case.   .  .  .  Yours  sincerely. 

Max  Dessoir. 

The  following  letter  is  representative  of  the  theo- 
logian's point  of  view  : — 

From  Rev.  James  F.  Driscoll,  D.D.,  New  York,  U.S.A. 

Dear  Sir, — The  notion  of  natural  death  as  set  forth  in  Catholic 
theology  and  in  the  traditional  Christian  philosophy  is  very  simple. 
Death  consists  in  the  separation  of  the  soul  from  the  body,  which 
separation  is  aptly  termed  "  dissolution."  The  soul  is  held  to  be 
a  spiritual  substance,  capable  of  existing  independently  of  the 
body,  though  naturally  fitted  to  be  united  with  it,  after  the  resur- 
rection, in  some  form  of  new  life  compatible  with  personal  identity. 
I  have  never  been  confronted  with  any  facts  or  reasons  which 
seemed  to  call  for  any  mode  of  conceiving  of,  or  formulating,  the 
phenomenon  called  death  in  any  other  than  this  simple  notion, 
which  is  the  one  held  by  the  vast  majority  of  Christians.  Neither 
have  I  ever  attempted  to  analyse  scientifically  the  processes  that 
may  be  involved  in  this  separation  of  the  soul  and  body,  or  to 
picture  to  myself  just  how  it  takes  place.  Some  light  on  this 
aspect  of  the  problem,  I  trust,  may  be  derived  from  your  forth- 
coming book. — Sincerely  yours,  James  F.  Driscoll. 

This  represents,  of  course,  the  traditional  conception 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS     169 

of  death,  but  cannot  be  taken  as  a  final,  scientific  ex- 
planation, for  the  reason  (1)  that  it  assumes  the 
existence  of  the  soul,  which  cannot  be  granted  by  the 
scientific  man ;  and  (2)  it  does  not  tell  us  anything  of 
the  actual  details  of  this  supposed  "  separation."  In 
other  words,  it  states  the  case,  from  that  particular  point 
of  view,  without  attempting  to  solve  it.  We  cannot, 
therefore,  say  that  this  is  in  any  sense  an  explanation  of 
death ;  but  Dr.  Driscoll  is  frank  in  stating  that  his  letter 
is  not  intended  to  be  such. 

The  followins:  communication  from  Count  Solovovo 
exemplifies  the  strictly  scientific  attitude  toward  this 
question ;  while  it  emphasises,  at  the  same  time,  the 
only  rational  way  of  solving  the  problem.      He  says : — 

From  Count  Perovshy-Petrovo-Solovovo^  St.  Petershirg,  Russia. 

I  believe  it  most  probable  that  Death  is  the  end  of  everything 
throughout  the  whole  realm  of  Nature.  I  believe  that  everything 
tends  to  support  this  conclusion ;  everyday  experience,  scientific 
experiment,  and  observation,  and  last — not  least — plain  common 
sense.  And,  before  all,  I  am  convinced  of  the  utter  inability  of 
religion  to  grapple  satisfactorily  with  the  problem.  And  if,  in 
spite  of  all  that,  there  is  still  a  lingering  doubt  in  my  mind  that 
this  negative  conclusion,  though  overwhelmingly  probable,  may 
yet  be  not  absolutely  certain,  I  owe  this  shadow  of  a  doubt  to 
certain  alleged  facts  of  psychical  research,  so-called,  only  and 
exclusively.  Peeovsky-Petrovo-Solovovo. 

Sergievskia  24,  St.  Petersburg, 
August  1908. 

Compare  with  these  expressions,  the  following  com- 
munication, which  represents  the  attitude  of  the  mystic. 
It  will  be  observed  that  Mr.  Purinton  assumes  the 
existence  of  a  soul,  and  also  the  reality  of  reincarnation 


170  DEATH 

— neither  of  which  doctrines  can  be  accepted  as  vahd 
until  scientifically  proved.  It  further  fails  to  supply  us 
with  any  of  the  psycho-physiological  explanations  neces- 
sary for  a  clear  understanding  of  this  important  crisis. 
However,  his  letter  is  of  great  interest,  and,  should  the 
existence  of  a  soul  be  proved,  would  be  well  worthy  of 
serious  consideration  from  the  philosophic  point  of  view. 

From  Edivard  Earle  Purinton^  Esq.,  New  York  City,  U.S.A. 

Death  is  the  periodic  withdrawal  of  the  soul  from  a  body 
grown  too  earthy  for  the  soul  to  use.  Every  soul  passes  through 
as  many  births,  lives,  and  deaths  as  are  necessary  for  complete 
earth  experience.  But  as  experience  involves  encrustation,  the 
process  of  learning  is  also  the  process  of  dying. 

Animals  die  a  "  natural "  death,  at  about  the  same  age  in  the 
same  species,  because  animals  have  but  one  dominant  trait  to 
express — strength  in  the  lion,  wisdom  in  the  serpent,  gentleness 
in  the  dove,  &c.  But  for  man,  ideally  at  least,  there  is  no  such 
thing  as  natural  death.  Because  man,  possessing  all  the  traits  of 
the  lower  animals,  would  require  as  many  lives  as  they  all,  in  order 
to  express  fully.  I  think  that  when  man  knows  himself,  and  dares 
be  himself,  death  will  appear  a  slight  episode,  or  perhaps  a  forgotten 
myth,  along  the  radiant  cycle  of  immortality.  And  the  method 
will  then  be  as  scientific  as  this  prophecy  now  looks  visionary. 

Edward  Earle  Purinton. 

Very  different,  again,  is  the  theory  of  death  advanced  by 
Dr.  J.  Butler  Burke,  in  the  communication  that  follows  : — 

Fro7n  Dr.  John  Butler  Burke,  Cambridge,  England. 
The  Nature  of  Death. 

To  understand  what  death  is,  it  would  be  necessary  to  know 
what  life  is,  for  it  is  obviously — to  all  appearances,  at  least — 
the  cessation  of  life  in  the  individual  organism.  I  say,  "to  all 
appearances,  at  least,"  because  we  have  no  evidence  whatever  that 
the  unknown  principle  which  infuses,  as  it  were,  the  organism  so 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS     171 

as  to  give  rise  to  vital  actions,  is  not  something  which  survives  the 
dissolution  of  the  organic  form,  and  the  garments  in  which  it  may 
have  been  clad. 

This  self-willing  and  self-conscious  entity  is  generally  awakened 
in  the  course  of  the  development  of  the  organism  by  which  it  comes 
into  harmony  with  the  world  around  it.  But  it  does  not  follow 
that  with  the  disintegration  of  the  organism  the  self-conscious 
principle  is  also  dissolved,  although  that  might  be  in  the  majority 
of  cases,  when  the  mind  and  will  have  not  developed  complete 
self-control  and  mastery  over  the  body.  The  question  is,  of  course, 
one  of  fundamental  interest  and  importance  psychologically. 

Amongst  men  and  women  of  great  strength  of  will,  intellectual 
power  and  force  of  character,  this  feeling — for  after  all  it  is  but 
a  feeling — that  the  mind  is  as  independent  of  the  body  as  it  is  of 
the  external  world,  seems  to  be  very  common  indeed.  Tennyson, 
if  I  remember  rightly,  in  The  Holy  Grail  and  The  Ancient  Sage, 
talks  of  feelings  such  as  these  : — 

"  In  moments  when  he  feels  he  cannot  die, 
And  know  himself  no  vision  to  liimself  ;  " 

and  again  when : 

"  The  mortal  limit  of  the  self  was  loosed, 
And  passed  into  the  nameless  as  a  cloud 
Melts  into  Heaven." 

He  speaks  elsewhere  of  "  the  clearest  of  the  clearest,  the  surest 
of  the  surest,  utterly  beyond  words,  when  death  seemed  an  almost 
laughable  impossibility."  His  friend,  the  late  Sir  James  Knowles, 
records  many  other  similar  instances  in  The  Nineteenth  Century, 
January,  1893. 

It  is,  in  fact,  a  very  common  experience  among  intellectual 
people,  and  an  inclination  of  a  vigorous  mind  combined  with  a 
correspondingly  low  vitality,  showing,  perhaps,  a  discord  between 
mind  and  matter. 

The  most  vivid  description  of  it  is  by  Goethe,  in  "Wilhelm 
Meister's  Apprenticeship"  in  Tlie  Confessions  of  a  Beautiful 
Soul : — 

"  During  many  sleepless  nights,  especially,  I  had  some  feelings 


172  DEATH 

so  remarkable  that  I  cannot  describe  them  clearly.  It  was  as  if 
my  soul  were  thinking  unaccompanied  by  the  body.  It  looked  on 
the  body  as  something  apart  from  itself,  much  as  we  look  on  a 
dress.  It  pictured  to  itself,  with  the  most  extraordinary  vividness, 
past  times  and  events,  and  felt  what  would  be  their  results.  All 
these  times  have  passed  away ;  what  follows  will  pass  too ;  the 
body  will  rend  like  a  garment,  but  I — that  well  known  I — I  am." 

And  again,  "  The  grave  awakens  no  terror  in  me ;  I  have  an 
eternal  life," 

It  may  be  said,  and  it  is  said,  that  this  is  all  imagination — 
a  waking  dream,  a  trance.  But  it  is  the  opinion  of  some  of  the 
most  profound  philosophers  that  it  is  not  a  waking  sleep,  but  the 
very  awakening  of  the  soul  itself.  Eminent  metaphysicians,  from 
Descartes  onwards,  tell  us  that  there  is  nothing  more  real  than 
the  consciousness  of  such  a  state  as  this,  and  that  whoso  has  thus 
grasped  the  reality  of  his  own  being  and  truths,  realising  in  him- 
self a  conscious,  self-determined  unit,  knows  that  not  only  I  Am, 
but,  having  reached  this  height,  I  Am,  and  must  Forever  Be. 

John  Butler  Burke. 

Very  contrary  to  the  views  just  expressed  are  those  of 
Professor  Haeckel,  illustrated  in  the  following  communi- 
cation or  letter  from  him,  in  reply  to  the  cn^cular 
request.      He  answers  as  follows : — 

From  Professor  Ernst  Haeckel,  Jena,  Germany. 

Jena,  16,  8,  1908. 

Dear  Sir, — You  find  my  view  of  Death  in  the  5th  chapter  of 
my  book  Lebeiiswunder  (1904) — The  Wonders  of  Life. — Respect- 
fully, Ernst  Haeckel. 

Referring  to  the  chapter  on  "  Death "  in  Professor 
Haeckel's  Wonders  of  Life,  we  extract  the  folloAving  as 
representative  of  his  views : — 

"  The  inquiry  into  the  nature  of  organic  life  which  we  instituted 
in   the  second  chapter  has  shown  us  that  it  is,  in  the  ultimate 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS     173 

analysis,  a  chemical  process.  The  *  miracle  of  life '  is  in  essence 
nothing  but  the  metabolism  of  the  living  matter,  or  of  the  plasm. 
...  If  death  is  the  cessation  of  life,  we  must  mean  by  that  the 
cessation  of  the  alternation  between  the  upbuild  and  the  dissolution 
of  the  molecules  of  protoplasm  ;  and  as  each  of  the  molecules 
of  protoplasm  must  break  up  again  shortly  after  its  formation, 
we  have,  in  death,  to  deal  only  with  the  definite  cessation  of 
reconstruction  in  the  destroyed  plasma-molecules.  Hence,  a 
living  thing  is  not  finally  dead — that  is  to  say,  absolutely 
incompetent  to  discharge  any  further  vital  function — until  the 
whole  of  its  j)lasma  molecules  are  destroyed.  .  .  .  Normal  death 
takes  place  in  all  organisms  when  the  limit  of  the  hereditary  term 
of  life  is  reached.  ...  As  Kassowitz  has  lately  pointed  out,  the 
senility  of  individuals  consists  in  the  inevitable  increase  in  the 
decay  of  protoplasm,  and  the  metai)lastic  parts  of  the  body  which 
this  produces.  Each  metaplasm  in  the  body  favours  the  inactive 
break-up  of  protoplasm,  and  so  also  the  formation  of  new  meta- 
plasms.  The  death  of  the  cell  follows,  because  the  chemical 
energy  of  the  plasm  gradually  falls  off  from  a  certain  height — the 
acme  of  life.  The  plasm  loses  more  and  more  the  power  to 
replace,  by  regeneration,  the  losses  it  sustains  by  the  vital 
functions." 

It  will  be  seen  that,  in  its  ultimate  analysis,  this 
definition  of  death  furnishes  us  with  no  better  idea  of 
the  process  than  might  be  supplied  by  the  words 
"  exhaustion  of  vital  function."  This  question  has  been 
discussed  elsewhere,  and  it  can  be  shown  that,  from  one 
point  of  view,  it  fails  to  explain  the  phenomena  of  death 
entirely,  since  we  come  into  a  "  vicious  circle,"  so  to 
say.  The  body  degenerates  because  of  its  loss  of 
vital  power,  and  loss  of  vital  power  takes  place  because 
the  body  degenerates !  It  is  obvious  that  no  final  de- 
finition of  death  can  be  obtained  from  arguments  such 
as  these. 

It  is  true  that  Haeckel  elsewhere  defines  death  as 
"  physiological  degeneration,  due  to  chemical  changes." 


174  DEATH 

This  furnishes  us  with  a  little  clocarer  idea  of  the  causes 
of  this  process  ;  but  it  does  not  tell  us  why  it  is  that 
chemical  changes  of  the  character  postulated  should  take 
place ;  and  no  direct  evidence  is  furnished  that  such 
changes  do  in  fact  take  place.  The  body  of  the  old 
man  is  constantly  being  replaced  by  fresh  material,  and 
may  be  said  to  be  in  one  sense  as  new  as  the  body  of  the 
babe — since  both  are  formed  from  new  material — viz. 
the  food  supply.  Yet  in  the  one  case  the  food  wall 
build  the  body  of  the  youth,  and  in  the  other  the  body 
of  the  old  man.  So  long  as  science  fails  to  recognise 
any  vital  force,  or  any  constructive  or  destructive 
tendency  in  the  body  other  than  the  energy  supposed 
to  be  derived  from  food  combustion,  it  is  certain  that  no 
definite  conclusion  can  be  arrived  at  by  way  of  explanation 
of  these  phenomena. 

It  would  be  impossible  to  conceive  a  greater  dissimi- 
larity of  views  than  those  just  expressed  by  Professor 
Haeckel,  and  those  that  follow — expressed  also  by  a 
physician — as  to  the  "real  nature  of  death."  In  his 
communication  our  correspondent  says : — 

From  Hip2^olyte  Baraduc,  M.D. 

Pakis,  France. 

Dear  Sir, — I  refer  you  to  the  work  which  I  wrote  upon  the 
death  of  my  dear  ones.  The  world  knows  nothing  about  death, 
does  not  prepare  for  it,  and  every  one  is  subject  to  it.  It  is 
a  phenomenon  against  which  one  is  powerless,  which  allows  the 
passage  of  the  spirit  in  the  geometrical,  stellar,  or  globular  form, 
as  all  the  ancient  mystics  declared.  It  is  sad  that  Christians  do 
not  know  better  the  point  towards  which  it  is  necessary  to  move. 
Their  religion,  so  beautiful  upon  earth,  is  insufficient  for  the  sum 
of  the  hereafter  in  the  superior  planes. — With  regards, 

Baraduc. 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS     175 

This  letter  of  Dr.  Baraduc  merely  refers  us,  it  will 
be  observed,  to  his  book  Mes  Morts.  The  experiraents 
contained  in  that  work  will  be  found  discussed  in  our 
section  "  On  Photographing  the  Soul."  Apart  from  the 
external  evidence  which  the  photographs  afford,  there  is, 
it  will  be  observed,  no  attempt  at  scientific  explanation 
of  the  nature  of  death,  but  merely  comment  upon  one 
or  two  of  the  problems  associated  with  it.  As  such,  we 
must,  therefore,  altogether  disregard  it  as  an  explanation 
of  the  cause  of  natural  death. 

Of  a  very  different  character  is  the  communication  from 
Dr.  Paul  Carus,  editor  of  The  Open  Court,  The  Monist,  &c. 
In  replying  to  our  letter  on  death,  Dr.  Carus  writes : — 

La  Salle,  III.,  Nov.  6,  1908. 

Dear  Sie, — Having  returned  from  Europe,  I  find  your  cour- 
teous letter,  and  will  say  in  reply  that,  according  to  my  definition 
of  "  death,"  it  is  simply  "  the  ceasing  of  the  functions  of  life."  As 
to  further  explanations  of  the  nature  of  death  and  its  significance, 
I  must  refer  you  to  passages  in  my  books,  among  which  I  would 
especially  recommend  those  which  you  find  in  Homilies  of  Science. 
For  instance,  the  chapters  "  The  Price  of  Eternal  Youth,"  "Reli- 
gion and  Immortality,"  "  Spiritism  and  Immortality,"  &c. 

This  letter  may  reach  you  too  late,  but  I  will  answer  your  ques- 
tion anyhow,  in  case  you  would  like  to  know  my  views  on  the 
subject. — Very  truly  yours,  Paul  Carus. 

Referring  to  the  passages  in  Dr.  Carus's  Homilies 
of  Science,  mentioned  by  him,  we  extract  therefrom 
the  following,  as  samples  of  his  attitude  toward  this 
question  : — 

'*  Death  is  a  natural  phenomenon,  not  less  than  birth ;  and  the 
agonies  of  death  are  generally  less  painful  than  the  throes  of  birth. 
The  problem  of  death  is  closely  interwoven  with  the  problem  of 


176  DEATH 

birth,  so  that  you  cannot  disentangle  the  one  without  unravelling 
the  other.  .  ,  .  Death,  then,  is  a  necessity  ;  but  serious  though  the 
idea  of  death  must  make  our  thoughts,  it  is  not  terrible ;  awful 
though  it  may  be,  it  must  not  overawe  us.  Death  is  like  the 
northern  sunset :  the  evening  twilight  indicates  the  rise  of  the 
new  morn.  The  nocturnal  darkness  of  the  end  of  life  is  the  har- 
binger of  a  new  day,  clothed  in  eternal  youth.  So  closely  inter- 
woven is  death  with  immortality.  .  .  .  Death  is  no  mere  dissolution 
into  all-existence.  Certain  features  of  our  soul-life  are  preserved 
in  their  individuality.  Copernicus  still  lives  in  Kepler,  and  Kepler 
in  Newton  ;  and  to-day  Copernicus  lives  in  every  one  of  us  who 
has  freed  himself  from  the  error  of  a  geocentric  concept  of  the 
world.  The  progress  of  humanity  is  nothing  but  an  accumulation 
of  the  most  precious  treasures  we  have — it  is  the  hoarding  up  of 
human  souls.  .  .  .  Although  a  ghost-immortality  of  disembodied 
spirits  is  impossible,  man's  existence  is  not  a  fleeting  phenomenon 
of  an  ephemeral  nature.  His  soul-life  is  not  of  yesterday,  and 
does  not  vanish  into  nothingness  to-morrow.  His  ideas,  as  well 
as  his  actions,  are  facts  that  continue  to  be  factors  in  the  future 
development  of  his  race.  The  life  of  a  single  individual  is  not 
a  separate  and  single  event  that  begins  with  his  birth,  and  dis- 
appears again  with  his  death.  It  is  the  product  of  a  long  evolu- 
tion of  many  thousands  of  generations.  Their  works  and 
thoughts  live  in  the  present  generation,  and  our  soul-life  or 
thought,  accompanied  with  the  same  kind  of  feelings,  will  con- 
tinue to  exist  in  the  future.  Those  who  think,  who  act,  and  who 
feel,  like  ourselves,  possess  our  souls,  and  in  them  we  shall  con- 
tinue to  live,  move,  and  have  our  being." 

It  will  be  obvious  to  the  critic  that,  from  the  physio- 
logical point  of  view,  the  above  extracts  furnish  us  no 
clue  as  to  the  nature  of  natural  death  ;  but  perhaps 
they  are  not  intended  to  do  so.  Dr.  Carus's  argument 
is  psychological  and  philosophical ;  and  although  this 
cannot  be  considered  any  adequate  description  of  death, 
still,  let  us  consider  the  problem  from  this  other  stand- 
point.    One  would  think  from  the  first  two  paragraphs  that 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS     177 

Dr.  Carus's  conception  of  the  persistence  of  conscious- 
ness, or  "  immortality  of  the  soul/'  amounts  to  this : 
That  our  thoughts  and  actions,  inasmuch  as  they  are 
part  of  ourselves,  persist  in  the  thoughts  and  memories 
of  others  !  We  ourselves,  as  individuals,  have  sunk  into 
nothingness,  passed  into  oblivion.  We  continue  to  exist 
merely  as  memories  in  the  lives  of  others. 

Such,  then,  is  Dr.  Carus's  conception  of  "  immortality." 
It  is  almost  a  farcical  definition  of  the  term,  because  in 
the  first  place  immortality,  as  it  is  usually  conceived,  ^ 
involves  persistence  of  individual  consciousness,  and,  so 
far  as  we  ourselves  are  concerned,  any  sort  of  persistence 
without  memory  and  consciousness  of  self,  would  be 
tantamount  to  annihilation.  From  the  point  of  view  of 
the  individual  who  dies,  therefore,  such  a  definition  of 
immortality  is  a  mere  begging  of  the  question,  and  it 
does  not  appear  to  us  that  Dr.  Carus's  position  is  in  any 
way  strengthened  by  his  contention  that  we  exist  in  the 
thoughts  and  memories  of  others  who  live  after  us.  To 
them,  we  exist  as  mental  concepts  only,  and  we  occupy 
the  same  relative  position  to  their  thinking  selves  as 
would  any  other  memory.  We  would  be  merely  an 
abstraction,  and  would  no  more  form  part  of  their  mental 
life,  or  live  in  them,  than  would  any  other  mental  con- 
cept— a  memory  of  a  past  achievement,  a  battle,  the 
picture  of  some  living  person.  Identity  involves  a 
thinking  subject.  The  thoughts  are  its  products,  and  we 
can  no  more  implant  one  identity  on  another  than  we 
can  cause  two  solid  substances  to  occupy  the  same  space. 
The  fact  that  we  or  our  deeds  linger  in  the  memory  of 
those  still  living  no  more  argues  that  we  live,  than  does 
the  memory  of  a  conflagration  prove  that  the  fire  is  still 
burning. 

The  two  following  letters,  from  Drs.  Bozzano  and  Ven- 
zano,  respectively,  mdicate  the  position  of  the  scientist- 

M 


178  DEATH 

pliilosoplier — one  who  has  duly  weighed  the  facts  and 
interpretations  of  psychical  research.  It  will  be  observed 
that  both  these  authors  practically  agree  in  their  view 
of  the  case — that  a  future  life  is  only  to  be  demonstrated 
by  means  of  psychical  investigation,  and  that,  were  it  not 
for  these  facts,  we  should  have  to  conclude  in  favour  of 
materialism. 

It  must  be  said,  however,  that  both  of  these  letters 
merely  raise  a  presumption  in  favour  of  immortality,  as 
we  have  said  before,  and  cannot  be  said  to  prove  it. 
That  can  only  come  from  facts.  Further,  neither  of 
them  gives  us  any  conception  of  the  "  real  nature  of 
death ; "  they  merely  state  the  views  of  their  authors  as 
to  the  probable  existence  of  the  soul  after  the  death  of 
the  body.  Nevertheless,  the  letters  are  of  great  interest 
as  illustrating  the  views  of  scientific  men  who  have  been 
duly  impressed  with  the  facts  of  psychical  research. 

From  Dr.  Ernesto  Bozzano,  Genoa,  Italy. 
What  do  you  consider  to  be  the  real  nature  of  death  ? 

Qualora,  dopo  le  profonde  indagini  isto-fisiologiche  cui  venne 
sottoposto  il  cervello  sullo  scorcio  del  secolo  passato,  non  fosse 
occorso  I'avvento  degli  studi  metapsichici,  ben  difficilmente  si 
sarebbe  evitata  la  conclusione  che  la  crisi  della  morte  per  gli  orga- 
nismi  animali  significava  I'arrcsto  funzionale  degli  organismi 
stessi,  con  cessazione  della  vita  e  conseguente  annientamento  di 
quella  sintesi  di  stati  di  coscienza  che  si  denomina  lo  personale  o 
anima ;  tutto  cio  malgrado  che  una  conclusione  siffatta  conducesse 
a  una  proposizione  filosoficamente  assurda,  quella  che  I'evoluzione 
deir  Universo  e  della  Vita  si  palesino  destituiti  di  finalita. 

Non  piu  cosi  dopo  Tavvento  delle  nuove  richerche,  in  virtu  delle 
quali  vennero  posti  in  evideuza  asj'ctti  nuovi  dell'  lo  subcosciente  in 
guisa  da  lasciare  intravvedere  la  possibilita  di  risolvere  sperimen- 
talmente  in  senso  afifermativo  il  grandioso  problema  dell'  esistenza  e 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS     179 

sopravvivenza  delF  anima ;  clie  ove  cio  si  realizzasse,  la  crisi  della 
morte  potrebbe  ragguagliarsi  a  uni  crisi  di  sviluppo  in  cui  avrebbe 
termine  la  fase  dell'  esistenza  terrena,  e  principio  quella  spirituale 
deir  anima,  per  la  quale  le  facolta  supernormali  della  subcoscienza 
costituirebbero  altrettanti  sensi  novelli  adattati  a  novelle  condi- 
zioni  di  ambiente ;  il  cbe,  filosoficamente  parlando,  varebbe  a  con- 
ciliare  i  portati  della  Scienza  con  gli  imperativi  categorici  della 
Ragione,  non  potendo  quest'  ultima  concepire  Vita  ed  Universe 
destituiti  di  finalita.  Ernesto  Bozzano. 

Translation : — 

If,  after  the  profound  histo-physiological  investigations  to  wbich 
the  brain  was  subjected  at  the  ending  of  the  past  century,  there  had 
not  occurred  the  advent  of  metapsychical  studies,  it  would  have 
been  very  difficult  to  avoid  the  conclusion  that  the  crisis  of  death 
for  the  animal  organism  signified  the  functional  arrest  of  the  organ 
itself  with  cessation  of  life,  and  the  consequent  annihilation  of  that 
synthesis  of  conscious  states  which  is  called  the  personal  Ego,  or 
the  soul.  All  this  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  such  a  conclusion 
leads  to  the  proposition  philosophically  absurd,  which  is,  that  the 
evolution  of  the  Universe  and  of  Life  are  declared  deprived  of 
finality. 

Since  the  advent  of  the  new  researches  it  is  no  longer  so.  By 
virtue  of  these  there  are  placed  in  evidence  new  aspects  of  the  sub- 
conscious Ego,  in  a  way  allowing  to  be  seen  the  possibility  of 
resolving  experimentally,  in  the  affirmative  sense,  the  great  problem 
of  the  existence  and  survival  of  the  soul ;  that  where  that  should 
be  true,  the  crisis  of  death  might  be  compared  to  an  unfolding,  in 
which  the  earthly  existence  would  have  an  end,  and  the  spiritual 
one  of  the  soul  a  beginning,  for  which  the  supernormal  faculties 
of  the  subconscious  would  constitute  so  many  new  senses,  adapted 
to  the  new  conditions  of  the  ambient.  Which,  philosophically 
speaking,  would  go  to  conciliate  the  findings  of  Science  with  the 
Categorical  Imperative  of  Reason,  the  latter  being  unable  to  con- 
ceive of  Life  and  the  Universe  deprived  of  finality. 

Ernesto  Bozzano. 


/ 


180  DEATH 

From  Dr.  Joseph  Venzano,  Genoa,  Italy. 
What  do  you  consider  to  be  the  real  nature  of  death? 

Le  pill  recenti  indagini  nel  campo  della  psicologio  e  della  meta- 
psichica  hanno  dimostrato  I'esistenza  di  facoltii  latenti  nella  sub- 
coscienza  die  emcrgono  in  circostanze  peculiari  e  che  per  la  loro 
supernormalita  e  in  virtii  di  quella  legge  di  finalita  che  regola  tutte 
le  co-se  create  sarebbe  assurdo  ritenere  dovessero  colla  morte  andar 
perdute  in  un  colle  scorie  del  corpo.  Tali  facolt^  porterebbero  a 
considerare  I'organismo  vivente  quale  temporanea  sede  di  un'  entita 
spirituale  in  via  di  ulteriore  e  progressiva  perfezione. 

La  morte  pertanto — dovendo  il  concetto  di  essa  necessariamente 
scaturire  da  quello  della  vita — non  sarebbe  che  un  proscioglimento 
dair  involucro  materiale  di  uno  spirito  tendente  e  sempre  piii  elevati 
destini.  Dott.  Giuseppe  Venzano. 

Translation : — 

The  most  recent  investigations  in  the  fields  of  psychology  and 
metapsychics  have  demonstrated  the  existence  of  faculties  latent  in 
the  subconsciousness  that  emerge  under  peculiar  circumstances,  and 
that  by  their  supernormality,  and  in  virtue  of  that  law  of  finality 
that  rules  all  created  things,  it  would  be  absurd  to  retain  [preserve  ?] 
should  they  in  death  be  lost  with  the  dross  of  the  body.  Such 
faculties  would  lead  one  to  consider  the  living  organism  as  the 
temporary  seat  of  a  spiritual  entity  in  the  way  of  ultimate  and 
progressive  perfection. 

Death,  then — the  concept  of  this  having  necessarily  to  spring 
from  Life — would  be  but  a  freeing  from  the  material  shell  of 
a  spirit  tending  ahvays  to  a  higher  destiny. 

Doctor  GuiSEPPE  Venzano. 

The  following  letter  from  Mrs.  Laura  I.  Finch,  while 
of  exceptional  interest  and  representing,  as  it  does,  the 
philosophico-mystical  point  of  view  in  an  excellent  and 
forceful  manner,  cannot  be  held  to  explain  death  from 
the  psycho-physiological  standpoint,  which  is  the  stand- 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS     181 

point  assumed  in  this  book,  and  is  the  aspect  of  death 
upon  which  we  wished  to  ehcit  further  information. 
Ultimately,  and  looked  at  from  a  sort  of  cosmological 
point  of  view,  Mrs.  Finch's  attitude  might  be  largely  true. 
But  for  our  present  purposes  and  from  our  present  stand- 
point, we  cannot  regard  this  letter  as  throwing  much 
light  upon  the  real  nature  and  causes  of  death.  We 
print  it,  however,  as  one  containing  speculations  of  a 
remarkably  ingenious  character,  excellently  expressed : — 

Fy^om  M7's.  Laura  I.  Finch,  Zurich,  Switzerland  {late  Editor 
of  "  The  Aniials  of  Psychical  Science,^^  &c.\ 

What  is  the  real  nature  of  death  % 

The  real  nature  of  death  should,  in  its  highest  sense,  be  a  con- 
summation, the  termination  of  a  cycle,  the  last  act  of  the  journeying 
of  the  soul  out  of  the  Absolute  back  into  the  Absolute. 

Just  as  disease  and  accident  may  be  looked  upon  as  incidents 
which  the  soul  lays  hold  of  in  order  to  free  itself  from  the  instru- 
ment incapable  of  fulfilling  its  behests  or  of  serving  further  as  a 
means  of  progress,  so  death  from  "  natural "  causes  may  likewise 
be  considered  as  a  sign  that  the  soul  is  still  immature,  and  in  need 
of  a  new  vehicle  of  ever-increasingly  finer  vibrations,  until,  ulti- 
mately, the  same  soul  has  through  its  various  manifestations 
acquired  a  knowledge  of  nature's  secrets,  is  no  longer  either  the 
victim  or  the  slave  or  even  the  master,  but  is  one  with  nature,  able 
to  identify  itself  with  all  that  is.  In  this,  the  highest  form  of  the 
manifestation  of  spirit,  the  body — under  the  control  of  an  en- 
franchised and  perfect  soul — should  be  of  such  a  fine  and  perfect 
nature — at  last  in  harmony  with  the  Spirit  of  the  Universe,  that 
death,  as  we  now  understand  it,  cannot,  simply  cannot,  exist 
for  it. 

To  the  Perfect  Understanding  death  is  a  paradox,  an  impossi- 
bility, just  as  a  deathless  body  would  be  an  impossibility,  a 
paradox,  to  the  immature  soul. 

Disease,  accident,  old  age,  and  moral  weakness — the  tottering 
steps  of  the  soul  in  its  infancy.     And  even  '^  natural "  death,  as 


182  DEATH 

understood  to-day,  is  the  soul's  mute  confession  of  ignorance,  of 
failure  ;  the  revelation  of  its  degree  of  evolution. 

The  soul  which  has  come  into  the  full  possession  of  its  inheri- 
tance, Knowledge,  such  a  soul  should  certainly  be  able  to  leave 
and  resuscitate  the  body  at  will,  and  maintain  the  body  in  perfect 
health  and  vitality,  just  as  long  as  it  was  deemed  necessary,  for 
cosmic  causes,  to  postpone  the  final  act  of  consummation.  Age 
can  have  no  further  meaning  for  such  a  soul,  for  time  and  space 
are  data  of  temporary,  human  invention,  and  can  exercise  no 
dominion  over  the  liberated.  And  free,  then,  indeed,  is  the  soul 
— free  in  the  highest  sense  of  the  word  :  standing  aloft  on  the 
dazzling  summits  of  manifestation,  and  at  one,  even  now,  with 
the  Divine.  It  comprehends,  and  therefore  knows,  no  limitations  ; 
its  centre  is  Itself,  the  Essence  of  all  that  is ;  its  compass  is  the 
Universe,  the  Absolute,  both  that  which  is  manifested  and  that 
which  is  unmanifested. 

And  the  ultimate  passing  out  of  such  a  tenant  from  the  body 
could  not  be  called  "  death  " — lacking  as  it  would  all  the  customary 
attributes  of  death.  It  should  be  an  event,  deliberately  chosen  by 
the  omniscient  soul  long  since  come  into  the  full  recognition  of  its 
relationship — its  oneness— with  the  Divine  All;  an  event  accu- 
rately predicted  beforehand,  a  passing  out  without  illness,  without 
feebleness,  without  suffering,  without  even  any  momentary  loss  of 
consciousness ;  a  passing  out  of  the  realms  of  manifestation  and 
personality ;  a  passing  into  the  very  heart  of  the  Universe,  into 
the  "Arms  of  God,"  into  the  Essence  of  Life,  into  the  Absolute. 

That  is  my  conception  of  what  was  meant  to  be  the  real  nature 
of  death.  Laura  I.  Finch. 

Our  next  correspondent  writes  us  as  follows : — 


From  Miss  E.  Katherine  Bates  (Author  of  " See?i  and  Unseen" 
*'  Do  the  Dead  Depart  ?  "  (&c.). 

Death  has  always  appeared  to  me  to  be  simply  the  process 
through  which  the  real  Ego  throws  off  or  sheds  the  outer  animal 
body   of  lower  rates  of  vibration ;   and  functions  thenceforth  in 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS     183 

the  inner  or  spirit  body  of  a  more  attentuated  form  of   matter, 
functioning  at  higher  rates  of  vibration. 

This  inner  body  (the  spirit  body,  as  St.  Paul  calls  it)  is  pre- 
sumably already  existing  in  our  physical  bodies,  and  is  the  medium 
of  such  phenomena  as  are  provided  by  the  appearance  of  the 
Double,  where  this  is  of  a  tangible  and  not  of  a  merely  subjective 
and  purely  mental  nature. 

This  inner  body  of  finer  matter,  at  higher  vibrating  rates, 
doubtless  is  the  one  that  leaves  the  outer  physical  body  during 
deep  sleep,  and  is  drawn  towards  those  spheres  to  which  it  is 
affinitive,  but  whence  it  must  return  to  the  animal  body,  under 
strict  conditions  of  Law,  until  the  moment  of  entire  release  from 
the  physical  prison-house  arrives. 

To  my  conception,  therefore,  death  is,  as  a  purely  scientific  fact, 
that  which  the  poets  have  always  discerned  it  to  be,  i.e.  the  twin- 
brother  of  sleep. 

Sleep  lets  the  prisoner  out  on  "  parole,"  whereas  death  is  the 
judge  who  grants  him  a  complete  and  final  release  from  his 
captivity  in  the  flesh.  He  will  then  be  able  to  remain  permanently 
with  his  friends  on  the  other  side,  in  place  of  paying  them  short 
visits  during  the  sleep  of  the  body,  visits  which  must  often  prove 
as  tantalising  as  they  are  delightful.   .   .  . 

I  am  asked  for  my  opinion,  and  not  for  evidential  facts  on  this 
great  subject.  There  are  many  facts,  however  (upon  their  own 
plane  of  existence)  which  bear  out  these  conceptions.  The  fact  of 
the  spirit  leaving  its  outer  physical  body  under  conditions  of 
trance  or  of  ordinary  sleep,  and  being  able  to  retain  the  con- 
sciousness of  experiences  gained  and  knowledge  conveyed,  under 
these  circumstances,  is  a  fact  to  which  increasing  numbers  of 
sensitives  can  testify. 

When  the  racial  sensitiveness  to  higher  vibrations  has  reached 
a  point  where  these  experiences  shall  have  become  sufficiently 
numerous  to  form  a  majority,  or  even  a  very  strong  minority,  it 
can  no  longer  be  ignored. 

As  we  learn  to  bring  back  these  experiences  of  our  sleeping 
hours,  so  we  shall  be  able  to  provide  more  and  more  evidence, 
strictly  scientific  and  capable  of  being  dealt  with  on  the  present 
plane  of  vibration. 


184  DEATH 

Then  death  will  truly  "lose  its  sting,"  as  the  grave  has  already- 
lost  its  victory — for  all  but  the  most  obstinate  and  elementary 
materialists. 

That  sting,  however,  can  never  be  removed  until  facts  have  con- 
vinced us  that  death  is  no  longer  to  be  considered  as  an  entrance 
into  hitherto  unknoivn  countries,  but  the  making  permanent  and 
substantial  those  conditions  of  life  with  which  we  are  already 
familiar,  but  of  which  we  are  now  only  conscious  in  fleeting 
moments,  few  and  far  between. 

"  Men  counted  him  a  dreamer — Dreams 
Are  bvit  the  light  of  clearer  skies 
Too  dazzling  for  our  naked  eyes  ; 
And  when  we  catch  their  fleeting  beams. 
We  turn  aside,  and  call  them — Dreams." 

— E.  Katherine  Bates. 

This  letter  opens  up  a  number  of  possibilities ;  of  that 
there  can  be  no  doubt.  It  further  insists  upon  the 
fundamental  point  that  only  by  evidence,  by  scientific 
facts,  can  the  great  question  of  survival  of  consciousness 
ever  be  solved.  This  we  shall  argue  at  considerable 
length  in  Parts  II.  and  III.  While  this  definition 
cannot  be  said  to  make  plain  to  us  the  actual  causation 
of  death,  as  it  does  not  indicate  the  cause  of  the  with- 
drawal of  the  body  "  possessing  higher  rates  of  vibra- 
tion " ;  yet  it  is  doubtless  very  near  the  truth  —  if 
anything  at  all  in  man  survives  death.  The  vibratory 
theory  of  death  is  set  forth  at  some  length  in  Mr. 
Carrington's  chapter  on  the  causation  of  death.  From 
every  point  of  view,  Miss  Bates'  letter  is  certainly  worthy 
of  the  most  respectful  consideration. 

Of  a  somewhat  similar  character  is  Dr.  Walter  Leafs 
communication,  quoted  below.  It  will  be  observed  that 
Dr.  Leaf  accepts  as  fundamental  a  "  spiritual  energy,"  and 
even  a  "  world  of  spirit,"  and  defines  death  as  "  the  dis- 
sociation of  spiritual  energy  and  matter."     This  may  be 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS    185 

very  true,  but  really  goes  little  further  than  the  older 
definition,  "  the  departure  of  life  from  the  body."  It 
will  be  noticed,  also,  that  Dr.  Leaf  accepts  a  spiritual 
world  as  proved,  which  we  cannot  do,  looking  at  the 
matter  as  scientists,  inasmuch  as  we  must  first  prove 
it.  But  further,  we  do  not  desire  to  know  only  the 
fad  of  the  separation  of  the  life  principle  from  the  body 
(which  is  more  or  less  common  knowledge),  but  the 
nature  and  the  causes  of  it.  This,  it  will  be  observed,  we 
fail  to  find  fully  explained  in  the  following  statement : — 

From  Walter  Leaf,  Litt.D.,  London,  England. 

Dear  Sir, — I  have  had  your  circular  letter  on  death  before  me 
for  some  little  time,  and  have  been  rather  puzzled  to  know  exactly 
what  answer  you  expect.  The  limitation  to  "natural"  death 
seems  to  exclude  any  consideration  of  death  in  itself,  or  how  it 
should  be  regarded  by  the  individual,  and  to  confine  the  subject 
to  the  causes  and  nature  of  senile  decay.  If  this  is  the  intention, 
I  certainly  have  not  the  physiological  knowledge  which  would 
justify  me  in  answering.  I  fancy,  however,  that  you  may  not 
wish  thus  to  limit  your  purview,  and  desire  rather  my  views  as 
to  the  reason  of  the  necessity  of  death  in  the  scheme  of  the 
universe,  though  in  that  case  I  do  not  see  why  death  by  disease,  &e., 
should  be  excluded.  I  therefore  have  endeavoured  to  compress 
my  views  upon  this  point  into  your  limits,  rather  at  the  expense 
of  clearness,  and  in  any  case  without  any  of  the  explanations  and 
reserves  which  such  a  statement  requires. — I  am,  dear  Sir,  yours 
faithfully,  Walter  Leaf. 

Our  phenomenal  world  is  due  to  the  interaction  of  two  worlds  of 
higher  dimensions — Spirit  and  Matter. 

"  Laws  of  nature "  represent  so  much  as  we  can  observe  of 
regularity  in  this  interaction. 

It  is  a  law  of  nature  that  a  limited  amount  of  spiritual  energy 
associates  itself  with  a  limited  amount  of  matter.  The  association 
we  call  Life,  the  dissolution  of  it  Death. 


18G  DEATH 

It  is  a  law  of  nature  that  this  association  can  exist  only  for  a 
limited  time. 

Why  this  should  be  we  caniiot  say ;  presumal)]y  it  is  a  necessary 
condition  for  the  fulfilment  of  that  spiritual  purpose  which  we  call 
Evolution.  A  time  may  come  when  the  condition  will  no  longer 
be  necessary. 

The  quantum  of  spirit  associated  with  a  quantum  of  matter 
thereby  becomes  circumscribed,  and  loses  some  of  its  spiritual 
relations,  descending  to  a  "  personality."  It  is  perhaps  necessary 
that  it  should  after  a  time  be  re-absorbed  into  universal  spirit  in 
order  to  renew  itself.     Thus  death  would  be  the  analogue  of  sleep. 

An  extension  of  Dr.  Leaf's  view,  from  the  standpoint 
of  a  physiologist,  is  contained  in  the  following  com- 
munication from  Dr.  Rabagliati,  which  is,  we  believe, 
as  near  to  an  exact  definition  of  death  as  any  of  the 
communications  received  by  us.  Dr.  Rabagliati  is  a 
believer  in  the  existence  of  a  life  or  vital  force,  and 
defended  this  view  in  his  introduction  to  Mr.  Carrington's 
Vitality,  Fasting  and  Nutrition.  His  definition  of  death, 
as  submitted  to  us,  is  as  follows : — 

From  Dr.  A.  Eahagliati,  ALA.,  M.D.,  F.R.C.S.,  &c.,  ^-c, 
Bradford,  England. 

Viewing  this  universe  as  the  effect  of  a  universal  cosmic  energy, 
emanating  from  an  infinite  source,  which  energy  therefore  consists 
of  an  infinite  series  or  forms  or  species,  I  define  natural  human 
death  as  follows  : — 

Natural  human  death  is  the  departure  from  the  human  body  of 
anthropino-bio-dynamic.  Animal  bodies  are  procreated,  each  sort 
by  its  own  form  of  bio-dynamic,  to  act  as  fit  dwelling  places  for 
animal  life.  Bio-dynamic  itself  is  a  species  of  the  universal  cosmic 
energy.  When  it  leaves  the  body,  death  ensues.  The  immediate 
cause  of  human  natural  death  is  nearly  always  such  a  choking  up 
or  blocking  of  the  human  house  of  life  by  excessive  exercise  of 
tropho-dynamic,  i.e.  poly-siteism,  kako-siteism,  and  pollaki-siteism, 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS     187 

and  poly-potism,  kako-potism,  and  pollaki-potism,  that  antliropino- 

bio-dynamic  is  compelled  to  leave  the  body,  as  it  is  no  longer  a  fit 

house  for  life. 

Explanation. — At  death  all  forms  of  cosmic  energy,  except  hylo- 

dynamic  (or  the  power  of  material  substance),  chemico-dynamic  (or 

the  chemical  power),  and  katharto-dynamic  (or  the  cleansing  power), 

mostly  exerted  through  the  action  of  micro-organisms,  leave  the 

human  body.     Were  this  not  so,  the  body  would  not  only  die,  but 

vanish,  as  in  fact  it  does  after  a  long  period  of  time,  however  our 

love  for  the  departed  may  induce  us  to  try  to  prevent  it. 

A.  Rabagliati. 
Bradford,  Eng.,  1th  August  1908. 

The  following  communication  from  Prof.  E.  B.  Wilson, 

author  of  The  Cell,  &c.,  is  the  typical  and  clear-cut  point  of 

view  of  the  biologist.     It  states  the  case  in  a  terse  and 

concise  manner : — 

Department  of  Zoology, 
Columbia  University,  New  York, 
28f7i  February  1910. 

Dear  Sir, — I  must  apologise  for  not  replying  sooner  to  your  note 
of  Jan.  25th.  I  should  not  care  to  attempt  a  definition  of  death 
for  publication.  Biologically,  death  is  to  be  regarded  as  the 
cessation  of  the  life  processes.  The  definition  of  death,  therefore, 
presupposes  a  definition  of  the  life  processes ;  and  the  latter  is  too 
complicated  a  matter  to  be  stated  briefly. — Very  truly  yours, 

Edmund  B.  Wilson. 

The  views  expressed  by  the  following  writers — not 
in  answer  to  our  circular  letter,  but  in  their  various 
writings  to  which  we  have  referred — may  be  printed 
consecutively,  since  they  represent,  more  or  less,  the 
same  point  of  view. 

Dr.  Brouardel,  in  his  Death  and  Sudden  Death  (p.  292), 
defines  death  as  follows : — 

"  Death  supervenes  when  poisons  manufactured  in  the  system, 
or  unwholesome  food  that  has  been  ingested,  can  no  longer  be  ade- 


88  DEATH 

/quately  removed  by  the  kidneys.  .  .  .  The  individual  is,  there- 
fore, poisoned,  either  by  his  food,  or  by  poisons  which  are  generated 
within  his  own  body,  i.e.  auto-intoxication." 

Dr.  J.  H.  Kellogg  defines  death  thus  : — 

;/    "  The  cause  of  old  age  and  natural  death  is  the  accumulation  of 
waste  matters  in  the  body." 

Dr.  R.  T.  Trail,  in  his  Physiology,  p.  203,  favoured  the 
idea  that  death  ensues  when — 

"  The  solids  are  so  disproportioned  to  the  fluids  that  the  nutri- 
tive processes  can  no  longer  be  carried  on." 


? 


Dr.  Rosenbach  contends  that — 

"  Death  ...  is  that  condition  of  organised  matte  "  in  which  all 
processes  of  causation  have  come  to  such  a  state  of  lest  that  they 
can  no  longer  be  put  in  motion,  since  the  grouping  of  the  atoms 
in  the  molecule  has  become  so  firm  that  the  liberation  of  living 
force  would  be  associated  with  a  destruction  of  the  molecule  " 
{Physician  versus  Bacteriologist,  pp.  82-3). 

Sir  Benjamin  Ward  Richardson,  in  his  Diseases  of  Modern 
Life,  pp.  103—4,  sums  up  the  causes  of  death  as  follows  : — 

"I  have  learned  that  the  gradual  transformation  of  the  vital 
organs  of  the  body  from  advanced  age  is  due  to  a  change  in  the 
colloidal  matter  which  forms  the  organic  basis  of  all  living  tissues. 
In  its  active  state  this  substance  is  combined  with  water,  by  which 
its  activity  and_flexibility  is  maintained  in  whatever  organ  it  is 
'present — brain,  nerve,  muscle,  eye-ball,  cartilage,  membrane.  In 
course  of  time,  this  combination  with  water  is  lessened,  whereupon 
the  vital  tissues  become  thickened,  or,  to  use  the  technical  term, 
'  pectous,'  by  attraction  of  cohesion,  the  organic  particles  are 
welded  more  closely  together,  until,  at  length,  the  nervous  matter 
loses  its  mobility,  and  the  physical  inertia  is  complete." 

^  One  of  us  has  summed  up  all  these  proposed  causes  of 
death  in  the  single  word,  hlockage. 


QUESTIONNAIRE  ON  DEATH— ANSWERS    189 

We  regard  some  of  these  theories  of  death  as  accu- 
rately representing  proximate  causes  of  death,  but  not  the 
inner,  ultimate  cause,  so  to  speak.  Further,  we  must 
insist  that  death  from  all  these  causes  would  really  be 
death  from  disease,  since  natural  death  can  hardly  be 
defined  as  due  to  any  of  these  factors,  as  we  have  shown 
elsewhere.  Natural  death  should  result  without  any  of 
the  morbid  accumulations  or  functionings  which  have 
been  postulated  by  these  authors.  We  believe  that  the 
life  force  ceases  to  operate  in  the  body  because  of  its 
blockage  in  one  or  another  of  the  ways  described  by 
these  authors ;  but  this  blockage  is  really  an  indirect 
and  not  a  direct  cause  ;  and  further,  as  we  have  said,  we 
could  hardly  define  death  due  to  such  causes  as  natural 
death.  Waiving  that,  however,  we  must  insist  upon  this 
fundamental  point:  that  the  separation  of  the  life  from 
the  body,  which  may  be  said  to  constitute  natural  death 
(judged  from  an  external  standpoint),  depends  upon 
certain  bodily  and  mental  conditions,  but  these  con- 
ditions are  not  the  direct  cause  of  the  severance  of  the 
body  and  the  life-energy,  but  only  the  indirect  cause. 
The  direct  cause  is  the  process  of  disconnection,  and 
only  by  defining  the  inmost  nature  of  that,  can  one 
actually  define  the  "  real  nature  "  of  death. 


CHAPTER  IX 

MY   OWN   THEORY   OF   THE   NATURE   OF   DEATH 
By  Hereward  Carrington 

Not  until  one  begins  to  look  up  tlie  literature  on  "  death  " 
does  one  discover  how  scanty  it  is ;  not  until  one  begins 
to  read  upon  the  subject  does  one  discover  how  little  is 
really  known  about  it !  For  my  own  part,  I  may  say 
that  I  took  every  means  known  to  me  to  make  my  read- 
ing as  complete  as  possible,  before  attempting  to  write  a 
book  upon  such  an  abstruse  question,  and  I  think  I  may 
fairly  claim  to  have  read  everything  of  importance  that 
has  been  written  upon  the  subject  from  the  scientific 
point  of  view.  But  little  of  any  real  value  was  to  be 
found,  with  the  exception  of  about  two  books  and  an 
equal  number  of  magazine  articles  !  The  encyclopaedias 
were  equally  useless.  The  Encyclopedia  Americana  con- 
tained a  couple  of  pages  on  the  subject — mostly  devoted 
to  sudden  death,  and  its  various  symptoms ;  and  a  very 
brief  note  was  found  in  one  or  two  other  encyclopaedias ; 
but  not  one  word  did  the  Encyclopccclia  Britannica  contain  ! 
When  such  an  authority  refrains  from  even  mentioning 
the  subject,  it  is  hardly  to  be  wondered  at  that  lesser 
works  should  contain  little  or  nothing  upon  the  matter. 

And  yet  it  is  astonishing,  when  we  come  to  consider 
it,  that  so  little  is  known,  and  so  little  interest  is  taken 
in  this  most  momentous  question.  Medical  men  have 
the  opportunity  of  studying  thousands  upon  thousands  of 
death-beds  during  the  course  of  the  year,  but  practically 

I'JO 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  191 

nothing  of  interest  is  ever  said  concerning  these  scenes. 
This  cannot  be  due  to  over  nicety  of  sentiment  on  their 
part,  for  repeated  experiences  of  the  kind  tend  to  deaden 
the  sense  of  the  awful  and  the  marvellous,  as  we  all  know. 
Nor  can  it  be  that  they  do  not  pay  strict  and  close  atten- 
tion to  what  is  going  on  before  them.  Many  physicians 
have  doubtless  watched  the  process  of  dying  with  the 
utmost  care.  The  only  rational  interpretation  of  this 
silence  is,  that  no  man  has  had  the  desire  to  come  forward 
and  attempt  to  explain  the  facts  and  the  phenomena  that 
he  is  constantly  observing.  The/<xc^s  are  seen  often  enough ; 
but  any  explanation  of  the  facts  is  quite  impossible  1 
That  would  certainly  seem  to  be  the  only  interpretation 
of  this  remarkable  and  prolonged  silence. 

But,  seeing  that  death  is  taking  place  all  around  us, 
every  day  of  our  lives,  and  that  no  man  can  escape  it — 
no  matter  how  well  or  how  long  he  may  live — is  it  not 
advisable  to  try  and  explain  that  which  has  puzzled 
philosophers  and  physiologists  so  long  ?  I  think  every 
one  would  like  to  see  the  question  solved  ;  but  no  one 
has  had  the  initiative  to  come  forward  and  attempt  to 
solve  it !  As  both  Mr.  Meader  and  myself  believe  that 
we  have  some  grain  of  truth  to  offer  to  the  world,  how- 
ever, upon  this  question,  we  do  not  hesitate  to  broach  it, 
and  offer  our  explanation  of  the  facts — for  what  it  may 
be  worth.  Speaking  for  myself,  I  may  say  that,  since 
I  prefer  the  Truth  to  all  else  in  this  world,  I  feel  that 
I  have  nothing  to  lose  by  coming  forward  in  this  manner, 
and  saying  that  I  believe  I  have  discovered  the  cause  of 
natural  death — and,  incidentally,  some  of  the  phenomena, 
at  least,  of  life. 

My  chief  reason  for  collaborating  in  the  writing  of 
this  volume  was  to  ascertain  how  much  was  known  of 
the  causes  of  natural  death,  to  summarise  what  had  been 
said  on  this  subject,  and  to  advance  what  is,  I  believe, 


192  DEATH 

a  new  theory  of  natural  death  and  its  causation.  Any 
theory  of  death  must  fill  a  number  of  requirements,  in 
order  to  be  really  explanatory.  It  must  reach  to  the 
very  heart  of  the  problem,  and  explain  not  only  the 
surface  phenomena,  but  the  very  essence  of  the  process 
we  see  before  us.  Further,  if  the  theory  be  sound, 
it  must  explain  all  the  facts,  both  physiological  and 
psychological;  and  must  also  be  capable  of  explaining 
sudden  death,  death  due  to  accident,  disease,  mental 
causes,  &c.,  equally  with  death  from  old  age.  I  might 
indeed  contend,  and  justly,  that  I  am  not  called  upon  to 
extend  my  theory  to  exceptional  and  odd  cases — not  to 
cases  of  death  due  to  accident,  to  sudden  death,  or  to 
disease,  since  I  am  only  attempting  to  define  natural 
death  ;  but  if  my  theory  be  found  to  fit  into,  and  explain, 
all  these  phenomena  equally  well,  that  is  surely  so  much 
the  better,  and  is  a  more  or  less  conclusive  proof  that 
the  theory  is  correct.  All  that  can  be  demanded  of 
any  theory  is  that  it  explains  all  the  facts,  in  a  simple 
and  satisfactory  manner,  and  I  think  I  may  claim  that 
the  theory  does  this.  Mr.  Meader  and  myself  differ 
somewhat  on  this  question  of  the  cause  of  natural  death, 
and  for  this  reason  we  have  thought  it  better  that  each 
should  elaborate  his  own  idea  in  a  separate  place.  In 
this  way  we  can  both  express  our  ideas  unimpeded. 
The  reader  also  has  the  advantage  of  having  two  sugges- 
tions instead  of  one,  and  may  thus  have  a  double  theory 
of  the  causation  of  death  laid  before  him. 

Let  us  first  of  all  consider  "  natural "  death.  We 
have  been  led  up  to  this,  and  have  had  most  of  the  mis- 
understandings cleared  away  by  our  discussion  of  the 
problem  of  "  old  age."  There  we  saw  that  it  was  not  so 
much  the  germs  that  are  to  be  dreaded,  as  the  condi- 
tion of  the  body  that  rendered  their  presence  and  groAvth 
possible  ;  and  we  can  at  least  form  a  conception  of  what 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  193 

that  is.  Decay,  degenerative  changes,  &c.,  are  all  patho- 
logical and  abnormal  states,  due  to  the  food  and  other 
habits  of  the  people,  and  none  of  these  would  be  present 
in  normal,  healthy  old  age.  But  death  is  commonly 
supposed  to  be  due  to  these  very  causes,  and  to  result 
because  of  them  ;  and  science  knows  no  reason  why 
death  should  ever  occur  so  long  as  these  changes  did 
not  take  place.  Then  are  we  intended  to  live  for  ever  ? 
Certainly  not !  How,  then,  can  natural  death  take  place  ? 
That  is  the  problem  to  be  solved,  and  I  think  it  can  be 
solved  easily  enough  if  we  consent  to  lay  aside  present- 
day  materialistic  physiology  and  its  teachings,  and  look 
for  something  in  man  which  is  a  little  more  hidden, 
which  cannot  be  discovered  by  the  aid  of  the  scalpel,  but 
which  is,  in  very  truth,  the  life  principle  itself. 

It  has  often  been  said  that  we  cannot  know  what 
death  is  until  we  know  something  of  the  nature  of  life, 
and  that  is  very  probably  true.  Death  has  also  been 
defined,  times  without  number,  as  "  the  cessation  of  life." 
But  what  is  the  use  of  that  definition  when  we  have  not 
the  slightest  idea  of  what  life  is  ?  Surely  Ave  are  in  a 
vicious  circle  here :  death  is  the  cessation  of  life,  and  life 
is  the  opposite  of  death !  How  can  we  ever  reach  any 
satisfactory  explanation,  so  long  as  we  are  content  to 
beat  about  the  bush  in  that  fashion  ? 

In  order  to  define  death  (natural  death),  therefore,  it 
will  first  of  all  be  necessary  to  give  a  definition  of  life. 
I  need  not,  indeed,  give  a  definition  of  its  essence — its 
very  innermost  nature — so  long  as  I  can  give  a  satis- 
factory definition  of  its  phenomena,  its  connection  with 
the  organism,  and  the  character  of  its  manifestations 
through  it.  If  "  life  "  were  once  understood,  we  might 
be  enabled  to  see  in  what  its  negation  consisted.  We 
can  conceive  the  opposite  of  a  thing  we  knoAv,  but  not 
the  opposite  of  a  thing  we  do  not.  Roughly,  then,  let 
me  attempt  a  definition  of  the  phenomenon  of  life. 

N 


194  DEATH 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  I  have  already  defined  life  in  my 
Vitality,  Fasting  and  Nutrition,  p.  334,  and  I  need  only 
re-state  the  position  I  there  took.  I  said  :  "  And  what  is 
life  ?  That,  of  course,  is  unknown.  But  I  venture  to 
think  that  we  shall  not  go  far  wrong  should  we  conceive 
it — on  its  physical  side — for  of  its  essence  we  are  quite 
ignorant — as  a  species  of  vibration''  ^  I  then  attempted 
to  show  how  this  conception  might  account  for  the  bodily 
heat  noted,  and  how  it  was  in  accordance  with  the  theory 
of  vitality  advanced.  Here  I  shall  endeavour  to  extend 
the  idea  in  another  direction.  By  it  we  shall,  I  think, 
be  enabled  to  account  for  death. 

If  the  manifestation  of  life  is  actually  a  species  of 
vibration,  and  life  manifests  at  a  certain  rate,  and  at 
that  rate  only  (or  within  certain  narrow  limits),  it  will  be 
seen  that,  in  order  to  render  impossible  the  manifestation 
of  life,  it  would  only  be  necessary  to  raise  or  lower  the 
rate  of  vibration  above  or  below  the  limits  designed  by 
nature  as  possible  for  the  manifestation  of  life,  in  order  to 
render  this  manifestation  impossible.  If  the  rate  of  vibra- 
tion be  above  a  certain  speed,  life  (or  its  physical  base 
or  body)  would  be  shattered,  and  its  manifestation  become 
impossible.  On  the  other  hand,  if  the  rate  of  vibration 
were  to  fall  below  the  minimum  limit  set  by  nature,  then 
life  would  lose  its  hold  of  the  organism,  and  drift  away, 
no  longer  able   to  manifest  through  that  body.     Such, 

1  It  may  be  objected  that,  in  thus  defining  life  as  a  species  of  vibration, 
I  have  not  explained  it  in  full.  As  I  have  repeatedly  said,  I  have  not 
attempted  to  do  so.  All  I  intend  accomplishing  here  is  a  definition  of 
the  manifestation  of  life,  and  a  statement  of  the  possible  conditions  under 
which  it  might  or  might  not  manifest.  That  is  all  that  is  attempted,  in 
the  case  of  any  other  energy  or  quality.  For  instance,  we  do  not  define 
the  essence  of  light  (so  to  speak)  when  we  say  that  it  is  vibration  at  a 
certain  rate  ;  nor  heat,  ditto.  But  we  know  what  we  mean  by  the  terms 
very  well,  and  there  is  never  any  demand  made  to  define  "light"  or 
"  heat "  more  accurately.  I  feel  that  it  is  the  same  with  life.  We  are 
dealing  with  phenomena  still,  and  not  with  noumena.  My  present  idea 
is  merely  advanced,  to  be  tested,  like  any  other  hypothesis. 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  195 

in  rough  outline,  is  the  theory.  Now  let  us  apply  it  in 
detail  to  the  facts. 

First,  let  us  consider  what  "  natural  death "  would 
mean  on  this  theory.  Assuming  that  a  certain  rate  of 
vibration  (of  the  nervous  tissue,  or  of  some  ethereal 
medium  acting  upon  nervous  tissue)  represents  the 
ideal  of  health,  we  might  suppose  that  all  rates  of 
vibration  above  or  below  this  would  represent,  more  or 
less,  manifestations  of  abnormality  or  disease — mental 
or  physical.  A  slight  lessening  of  the  rate  of  vibration 
would  indicate  a  lessened  amount  of  vitality — sluggish- 
ness, enervation,  depletion,  and  all  that  goes  with  these 
states.  On  the  other  hand,  an  elevation  of  the  rate  of 
vibration  would  induce  undue  excitement,  excessive 
stimulation,  abnormal  passions  and  emotions,  feverish 
conditions,  et  hoc  gemis  omne.  I  need  not  here  go  into 
the  medical  details  of  this  theory,  and  of  its  applica- 
bility to  disease :  possibly  I  shall  do  so  on  another 
occasion.  At  present  I  only  wish  to  indicate  its  applica- 
bility and  explanatory  power,  so  far  as  the  phenomena 
of  life  and  of  death  are  concerned.  But  any  medical 
man  will  see  its  applicability  and  potentialities,  if  true. 

Now,  we  may  suppose  that  this  rate  of  vibration 
would  be  influenced  in  two  ways — by  the  condition  of 
the  body,  and  by  the  state  of  the  mind.  If  the  body 
be  choked  up  with  debris,  and  clogged  so  that  life 
cannot  manifest  through  it,  then  the  rate  of  vibration 
will  be  so  lowered  that  only  a  very  little  life,  or  life 
of  a  low  order,  can  become  manifest.^  If,  on  the  other 
hand,  the  mind  be  unduly  excited ;  if  it  be  stimulated 

^  This  might  also  account  for  the  phenomena  of  evolution.  Professor 
F.  C.  S.  Schiller  wrote  some  years  ago,  in  fact  {Riddles  of  the  Sphinx, 
p.  294) :  "  If  the  material  encasement  be  coarse  and  simple,  as  in  the 
lower  organisms,  it  permits  only  a  little  intelligence  to  permeate  through 
it  ;  if  it  is  delicate  and  complex,  it  leaves  more  pores  and  exits,  as  it 
were,  for  the  manifestations  of  consciousness."  I  venture  to  think  this 
is  quite  in  line  with  my  theory. 


196  DEATH 

and  raised  to  a  pitch  of  great  emotional  or  intellectual 
activity,  this  would  doubtless  correspond  to  an  in- 
creased rate  of  vibratory  action  ;  and,  thus  increasing  the 
activity  of  the  organism  through  which  it  manifests,  by 
reason  of  its  raising  the  rate  of  vibration  of  its  nerve 
centres,  it  would  produce  disastrous  consequences  in 
that  organism.  A  slight  raising  or  lowering  of  this  rate 
of  vibration  would  thus  produce  disease  of  one  character 
or  of  another ;  and  when  the  rate  of  vibration  exceeds 
a  certain  limit,  then  life  would  be  no  longer  possible  at 
all — at  least  in  that  body. 

Now,  applying  this  theory  to  the  problem  before  us, 
I  think  we  have  a  satisfactory  explanation  of  natural 
death,  as  well  as  of  all  the  sudden  deaths — deaths  due 
to  accident,  disease,  &c.  Let  us  see  if  this  is  not  the 
case. 

Take,  first,  a  supposedly  typical  case  of  "  natural " 
death.  As  the  result  of  years  of  living  contrary  to 
the  laws  of  nature  (more  or  less)/  the  body  has  become 
enfeebled,  the  vitality  low,  the  powers  sluggish,  the 
chemical  composition  of  the  body  altered,  and  the 
tissues  more  or  less  clogged  with  d(^bris  and  mal- 
assimilated  food  material.  Once  this  process  of  blockage 
and  decay  has  begun,  it  proceeds  more  or  less  rapidly, 
according  to  the  condition  of  the  organism.  Thus,  I 
conceive  that  it  would  be  impossible  for  any  person  in 
perfect  health  to  die  :  but  no  one  is  in  perfect  health ! 
This  process  of  blockage,  then,  goes  on  from  day  to  day, 
until  there  comes  a  time  when  life  cannot  set  the  vital 
machinery  in'  motion.     Thus  we  have  the  state  which 

^  No  one  can  live  ahsolutcly  according  to  the  laws  of  nature.  That 
would  be  an  ideal  condition — which  does  not  exist  as  an  actuality. 
However  closely  we  may  oliey  the  laws  of  nature,  therefore,  so  far  as 
they  are  known  to  us,  we  are  pervertinp^  tliem  every  day  of  our  lives  to 
a  great  or  an  infinitesimal  degree.  For  this  reason,  death  ultimately 
comes  to  us. 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  197 

I  defined  as  death  in  my  Vitality,  Fasting  and  Nutrition, 
pp.  330-1,  viz.:  "That  condition  of  the  organism  which 
renders  no  longer  possible  the  transmission  or  mani- 
festation of  vital  force  through  it — Avhich  condition  is 
probably  a  poisoned  state  of  the  nervous  system — due, 
in  turn,  to  the  whole  system  becoming  poisoned  by  toxic 
material  absorbed  from  the  blood." 

I  now  think  I  see  a  step  further  than  I  did  when  I 
wrote  that  passage.      I  now  think  I  see  how  it  is  that 
life   is   prevented  from  manifesting   through    the   body.       ' 
It  is  hecansG  the  rate  of  mhration  at  which  life  can  manifest   •■     \ 
cannot  he  reached.     In  such  a  body,  the  minimum  rate  V 

of  vibration  at  which  life  can  become  manifest  to  us 
cannot  be  attained.  Its  nervous  mechanism  cannot  be 
set  in  motion.  I  should  thus,  therefore,  define  natural 
death,  or  death  from  old  age : 

IT    IS    THE    INABILITY   OF    THE    LIFE   FORCE    TO   RAISE 
TO     THE     REQUISITE     RATE     OF    VIBRATION     THE 

NERVOUS     TISSUE     UPON     WHICH     IT     ACTS ITS 

MANIFESTATION      THUS     BEING      RENDERED      IM- 
POSSIBLE. 

We  have  here,  I  think,  a  complete  and  satisfactory 
definition  of  natural  death — offered,  I  believe,  for  the 
first  time. 

I  am  well  aware  of  the  fact  that  present-day  science 
does  not  recognise  any  such  separate  life  force  as  I  have 
postulated ;  but,  on  the  contrary,  asserts  that  life  is  the 
very  product  of  the  functioning  of  the  body.  Some 
years  ago  this  was  held  (in  the  crudest  form)  to  be 
true  of  mind  also ;  but  this  is  now  universally  given  up, 
and  I  feel  assured  that  the  present  position  with  regard 
to  life  and  vitality  will  shortly  have  to  be  given  up  also. 
There  is  no  proof  whatever  that  the  present  conception 
or  interpretation  of  the  facts  is  correct ;  all  that  science 


198  DEATH 

has  shown  in  this  particular  field  is  that  a  certain 
amount  of  organic  tissue  change,  and  a  certain  amount 
of  life  (so  to  speak)  are  present  at  the  same  time ;  and 
it  has  been  by  no  means  proved  that  one  creates  the 
other.  All  that  is  proved  is  coincidence;  not  causation. 
Orthodox  science  claims  that  the  destruction  of  a 
certain  amount  of  matter  (organic)  brings  into  being  a 
certain  amount  of  life :  Dr.  Rabagliati  and  myself,  on 
the  contrary,  hold  that  the  manifestation  or  expenditure 
of  a  certain  amount  of  life  wastes  or  displaces  a  certain 
amount  of  organic  matter  (which  is  made  good  by  a 
proportionately  small  or  large  amount  of  food-material). 
We  can  take  all  the  facts  of  physiological  science  and 
interpret  them  in  a  different  manner.  Just  as  one 
school  of  psychologists  asserts  that  the  waste  of  the 
substance  of  the  brain  does  not  actually  produce  the 
thought,  but  is  only  coincidental  with  it  (or  is  even 
caused  by  it) ;  so  we  contend  that  all  the  vital  wastes 
of  the  body  may  be  looked  at  from  the  same  stand- 
point ;  and  that,  instead  of  the  food  causing  the  bodily 
energy,  vital  energy  wastes  the  bodily  tissues  by  acting 
upon  them ;  and  this  loss  is  invariably  made  good  by 
a  proportionate  amount  of  food.  I  argued  this  position 
at  great  length  in  my  Vitality,  Fasting  and  Nutrition, 
pp.  225-303,  and  Dr.  Rabagliati  also  strongly  insisted 
upon  this  possible  alternate  interpretation  of  the 
observed  facts,  in  his  masterly  and  excellent  Intro- 
duction to  my  book ;  and  I  shall  only  refer  the  reader 
to  the  text  for  an  elaboration  of  that  idea.  Here  I 
need  only  say  (and  on  this  I  insist),  that  this  idea  of 
a  separate  life  force  is  quite  'possible,  and  is  a  tenable 
position  and  theory,  is  in  accord  with  all  the  known 
facts  of  experimental  physiology,  and  also  enables  us  to 
explain  many  facts  which  on  the  ordinary  theory  we 
cannot  explain.     For  these  reasons,  I  accept  this  theory 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  199 

as    substantially    correct,    and    shall    proceed    with    the 
argument  as  if  it  were  true.)     See  Appendices  B  and  C.) 
Dr.    Charles   S.    Minot,  indeed,  when  discussing  this 
difficult  question,  expressed  himself  as  follows : — 

"  No  mechanical  explanation  or  theory  of  conscious  automatism 
suffices,  but  a  vital  force  is  the  only  reasonable  hypothesis;  the 
nature  of  that  force  is,  for  the  present,  an  entire  mystery,  and 
before  we  can  expect  to  discover  it,  we  must  settle  what  are  the 
phenomena  to  be  explained  by  it." 

And  thirty  years  later  Dr.  Minot  was  still  able  to  say : — 

"So  Uttle  have  we  gained  since  1879  in  our  comprehension 
of  the  basic  phenomena  of  living  things,  that  were  I  to  re-write 
the  abstract  in  accordance  with  present  knowledge,  I  should  not 
change  it  essentially.  The  vitalistic  hypothesis  still  seems  to  me 
scientifically  the  best"  {Age,  Groivth  and  Death,  p.  267). 

It  may  be  added  that  there  is  a  slow  but  distinct 
tendency  among  biologists  to  revert  to  some  vitalistic 
hypothesis  for  an  explanation  of  living  matter  and  its 
phenomena.  (See,  e.g.,  Wilson,  The  Cell,  pp.  394,  417, 
434,  &c.)  And  I  may  point  out,  that  if  this  alterna- 
tive explanation  of  the  facts  is  a  possible  one,  it  throws 
an  entirely  new  light  on  many  ill-understood  historical 
phenomena.  Take,  for  instance,  the  cases  of  "  raising 
the  dead."  I  think  we  shall  find  that  many  of  these 
cases  assume  an  entirely  new  aspect  when  considered 
from  this  standpoint,  and  having  in  mind  the  theory 
advanced.  Thus,  Sir  Benjamin  Ward  Richardson,  in 
his  Ministry  of  Health,   writes  as  follows : — 

"What,  then,  we  should  abstractly  call  'vitality'  is  universal, 
and  in  persistent  operation  in  inanimate  matter  constituted  to  be 
animated.  What  we  call  life  is  the  manifestation  of  this  persistent 
and  all-pervading  principle  of  nature  in  properly  organised  sub- 


200  DEATH 

stance.  What  we  call  death,  or  de vital isation,  is  the  reduction 
of  matter  to  the  sway  of  other  forces,  which  do  not  destroy  it, 
but  which  cliange  its  mode  of  motion  from  the  concrete  to  the 
diffuse,  and,  after  a  time,  render  it  altogether  incapable  of  mani- 
festing vital  action  until  it  be  recast  in  vital  mould.  We  are  at 
this  moment  ignorant  of  the  time  when  vitality  ceases  to  act 
on  matter  that  has  been  vitalised.  Presuming  that  an  organism 
can  be  arrested  in  its  living  in  such  a  manner  that  its  parts  shall 
not  be  injured  to  the  extent  of  actual  destruction  of  tissue  or  to 
change  of  organic  form,  the  vital  wave  seems  ever  ready  to  pour 
into  the  body  again  so  soon  as  the  conditions  for  its  action  are 
re-established.  Thus,  in  some  of  my  experiments  for  suspending 
the  conditions  essential  for  the  visible  manifestation  of  life  in  cold- 
blooded animals,  I  have  succeeded  in  re-establishing  the  condition 
under  which  the  vital  vibrations  will  influence  after  a  lapse,  not  of 
hours,  but  even  of  days ;  and,  for  my  part,  I  know  no  limitation 
tc  such  re-manifestation." 

The  extreme  suggestiveness  of  these  remarks  need 
hardly  be  pointed  out,  bearing  as  they  do  upon  the 
possible  interpretation  of  historic  cases  of  raising  the 
dead.  So  long  as  no  part  of  the  organic  structure  is 
impaired,  or  rendered  useless,  there  seems  to  be  no  valid 
reason  why  the  bodily  vitality  and  life  should  not  be 
forced  back  into  the  body  by  some  one,  who  perhaps 
understands  the  law  of  such  vital  re-adjustment.  On 
the  theory  that  vitality  is  a  separate  force  ^vhich  can 
exist  apart  from  the  bodily  structure,  this  could  easily 
be  conceived;  and  it  could  even  be  conceived  on  the 
materialistic  hypothesis — that  vital  energy  is  a  mere 
resultant  of  the  total  bodily  functions.  On  that  theory 
life  is  a  product,  as  it  were,  of  such  functionings,  and 
is  merely  arrested  or  ceases  to  be,  because  the  organs 
which  brought  life  into  being  cease  their  activity. 
Once  these  organs  could  be  re-stimulated  into  action, 
life  should  re-manifest,  by  all  the  laws  known  to  us,  or, 
at   least,  there   is   no   valid    objection,  to   our   thinking, 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  201 

to  its  doing  so.  Whij  life  does  not  thus  re-manifest  in 
bodies  whose  structure  is  unimpaired  is  really  a  mystery, 
but  it  is  probably  due  to  the  fact  that  the  adjustment 
between  the  life  force  and  the  body  is  impaired,  and 
in  some  way  interfered  with  beyond  recall.  There  are 
many  cases  on  record  in  which  a  man  has,  e.g.,  read  a 
telegram  and  dropped  dead  instantaneously.  Surely 
the  bodily  conditions  before  and  after  such  a  catastrophe 
must  differ  almost  infinitesimally ;  and  yet  there  is  all 
the  difference  in  the  world  between  that  man's  condition 
before  and  after  such  a  stupendous  event !  What  has 
taken  place  ?  What  physiological  reason  is  there  for 
thinking  that  life  cannot  be  made  to  re-manifest  in 
such  a  body  ?  It  has  always  appeared  to  me  that, 
were  the  laws  of  life — its  manifestation  and  vital  con- 
nection with  the  body — more  thoroughly  understood, 
cases  of  "  raising  the  dead "  might  be  far  more  plenti- 
ful than  they  are  at  present,  and  they  would  no  longer 
be  considered  "  miraculous "  by  the  public  at  large. 
Surely  this  must  be  because  the  nervous  system  is 
involved,  and  it  is  because  of  the  shock  that  death  takes 
place  ?  The  total  insufficiency  of  the  current  theories 
of  life  and  of  death  is  never  more  plainly  illustrated  than 
in  cases  of  this  character.  On  the  materialistic  theory, 
why  should  stoppage  of  the  heart,  or  its  emptying  of 
blood,  cause  sudden  death  ?  And  how  comes  it  about 
that  cardiac  massage  can  restore  the  heart-beat  and  life, 
several  minutes  after  a  heart  has  stopped  beating,  when 
the  man  would  normally  be  pronounced  quite  dead  ? 
On  the  theory  outlined  above,  it  seems  to  me  all  such 
facts  are  readily  explained.  Cardiac  massage,  e.g.,  would 
restore  a  certain  vibratory  action  to  the  system,  which 
would  render  possible  the  re-manifestation  of  life  through 
it.  In  the  case  of  the  heart-failure,  the  rate  of  the  life- 
vibration  would  be  either  raised  or  lowered  so  suddenly 


202  DEATH 

and  so  tremendously,  thiit  its  manifestation  would  no 
longer  be  possible.  Just  as  light  would  suddenly  jump 
into  invisibility  were  we  sudd'enly  to  increase  its  rate  of 
vibration,  and  remain  invisible  indefinitely  so  long  as 
we  retained  that  rate,  just  so  would  life  instantly  become 
invisible  and  intangible,  and  would  cease  to  function  on 
this  plane,  where  it  is  visible  or  sensible  to  us. 

Having  defined  natural  death,  let  us  see  if  this  theory 
applies  to  all  the  other  known  facts,  and  explains  them 
in  a  satisfactory  manner.  I  think  we  shall  find  that  it 
does.     I  should  begin  with  death  from  mental  causes. 

To  take  a  typical  case,  a  man  reads  a  telegram,  and 
drops   dead.      In   such  a  case,  I  have  only  to  suppose 
that  the  rate  of  vibration  was  raised  to  such  a  pitch, 
in  consequence  of  the  mental  emotion  and  excitement, 
that  life  shattered  itself,  as  it  were,  and  destroyed  its 
physical  basis  for  life-manifestation.     Death  from  exces- 
sive  heat   or   excessive   cold   would   be   caused    by   the 
gradual  raising  or  lowering  respectively  of  the  vibratory 
action    of    life.      Death    from    sudden    physical    shock, 
jar,    electric    current,    lightning,    &c.,    would    raise    the 
vibration  of  life  to  such  a  pitch  that  it  would  become 
extinct  immediately.     Just  as  light  would  cease  to  bo 
light    (for    us)    as    soon    as   the    rate    of   its  vibrations 
passes    a    certain    number    per    second,    so    would    life 
vanish    (for   us)   as    soon  as  the   rate   of    its  vibrations 
passed  its  proportionately  fixed  and  set  limit.     In  both 
cases  there  would  be  apparent  annihilation,  but  in  both 
cases  the  vibrations  would   continue  to   persist  unseen, 
unsensed,  and   unknown  to  us.      Life  might  then    per- 
sist, after  the  physical  destruction  of  the  body ;  and,  in 
fact,  must  so  persist,  unless  we  are  prepared  to  defend 
the  doctrine  of   immediate   annihilation    of  energy   and 
the  complete  upsetting  of  the   laws   of  evolution,  pro- 
gression,   continuity,    and    the    conservation    of    energy. 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  203 

The  bearing  of  all  this  on  psychical  research  need  only 
be  pointed  out  in  this  place. 

Coming  now  to  death  from  diseases  of  various  kinds, 
we  find  the  same  theory  equally  applicable  here,  as  before. 
In  all  such  cases  life  would  be  unable  to  manifest,  for  the 
reason  that  it  would  be  unable  to  raise  the  rate  of  bodily 
vibration  to  the  requisite  pitch,  in  order  to  manifest 
through  it.  The  condition  would  be  very  much  the 
same  as  in  all  cases  of  natural  death,  but  death  would 
come  more  suddenly,  more  painfully,  and  would  cut  off  a 
number  of  years  from  that  person's  life.  But,  beyond  some 
differences  in  detail,  the  same  cause  would  apply  equally 
in  both  cases,  and  would  explain  them  both  equally  well. 

Now  let  us  turn  to  the  most  difficult  of  all — cases  of 
sudden  death.  Take  a  ease  of  rupture  of  the  heart. 
Personally,  I  could  never  see  why  (apart  from  the  shock 
to  the  nervous  mechanism)  rupture  of  the  heart,  and 
even  its  complete  emptying  of  blood,  should  induce 
sudden  death.  The  nerves  throughout  the  body  are 
still  nourished  with  blood,  and  would  be  for  some  minutes 
after  the  heart  was  ruptured.  Why,  then,  should  this 
cause  sudden  death  ?  ^ 

I  think  all  cases  of  sudden  death  might  be  explained 
as  easily  and  as  fully.  The  sudden  raising  or  lowering 
of  the  vibration  of  life,  because  of  the  suddenly  induced 
mental  or  physical  change,  would  necessitate  the  raising 
or  the  lowering  of  the  vibration  of  the  nervous  mechanism 

^  In  looking  through  works  on  sudden  death,  one  cannot  help  but  be 
struck  by  the  total  lack  of  inquiry  into  the  real  cause  of  such  deaths. 
The  author  is  invariably  content  to  state  that  death  has  resulted  from 
a  rupture  of  the  cardiac  muscle,  e.g.,  or  from  angina  pectoris.  But  when 
we  stop  to  ask  how  can  either  of  these  conditions  actually  cause  death, 
we  find  no  answer  whatever — not  even  an  attempt  at  an  answer!  We  are 
told  that  death  does  take  place  suddenly  because  of  these  accidents, 
and  that  is  all.  Certainly  we  cannot  be  blamed  for  attempting  to  formu- 
late an  hypothesis  which  will  explain  these  facts,  and  look  at  this  matter, 
not  from  the  mere  standpoint  of  an  outsider,  helpless ;  but  as  one 
attempting  to  understand  the  very  innermost  essence  of  the  phenomenon 
he  sees. 


204  DEATH 

accordingly ;  and,  if  this  were  to  pass  beyond  a  certain 
rate  in  either  direction  it  would  mean  annihilation — 
so  far  as  we  are  concerned — until  the  rate  of  vibration 
could  again  be  lowered  or  raised  sufficiently  to  allow 
the  re-manifestation  of  life.  In  some  cases  this  might 
be  possible.  Massage  might  effect  this  result,  for  one 
thing ;  hypnotic  suggestion  or  spontaneous  trance  might 
bring  this  to  pass,  for  another — when  the  vibration  had 
been  too  high  previously — this  enabling  us  to  perceive 
the  rationale  of  Miss  Molly  Fancher's  remark,  e.g.,  that 
"  only  the  trances  and  spasms  saved  my  life."  -^  Electricity 
mioht  stimulate  into  action  nerves  whose  vibration  had 
been  a  trifle  too  slow  to  allow  of  the  manifestation  of  life ; 
other  stimulants  might  act  in  a  similar  manner.  Only 
in  those  cases  in  which  the  shock  and  the  rate  of  change 
had  been  so  great,  that  (1)  either  the  structure  of  the 
body  had  been  destroyed;  or  (2)  the  medium  of  re- 
manifestation  had  been  shattered,  would  re-manifesta- 
tion and  re-vivification  become  impossible.  In  such  cases 
life  would  be  severed  from  the  body  for  good  and  all. 

This  theory  of  life  and  its  connection  with  the  or- 
ganism also  enables  us  to  explain  several  puzzling  facts 
which  have  always  been  stumbling-blocks  in  physiology, 
and  still  are.  I  refer  to  sleep  and  to  insanity.  Let  us 
first  take  sleep.  The  innermost  nature  of  this  process 
is  a  mystery  to  orthodox  science ;  but  it  becomes  intel- 
ligible to  us  on  the  theory  outlined  above.  We  should 
suppose,  from  all  analogy,  that  the  vibration  of  life  would 
get  shaken  and  jarred  out  of  its  perfect  rlujtlim  as  the 
result  of  the  day's  excitement  and  activities;  and  that 
it  would  be  necessary  to  induce  some  state  of  the  body 
in  which  these  vibrations  of  life  could  be  again  equalised, 
ready  for  the  next  day's  activities ;  and  if  this  period  of 
rest  and  re-adjustment  was  not  allowed,  then  the  vibra- 

^  Molly  Fancher,  by  Judge  A.  N.  Dailly,  p.  22. 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  205 

tions  would  become  more  and  more  disturbed,  more  and 
more  inharmonious  and  unrhythmic,  until  the  connec- 
tion of  the  life  force  with  the  organism  would  be 
totally  mal-adjusted,  and  insanity  and  death  ensue. 
Sleep  would  be,  therefore,  a  time  of  rest  necessary  for 
the  re-halancing  and  re-ccdjustment  of  the  vibrations  of  life. 

We  have  just  said  that  continued  loss  of  sleep  will 
induce  insanity  more  readily  and  more  quickly  than 
almost  any  other  cause.  It  is  asserted  that  ten  days 
is,  as  a  rule,  the  greatest  length  of  time  that  any  human 
organism  can  exist  without  sleep.  Why  should  so  short 
a  period  prove  so  disastrous  ?  Science  cannot  answer  ; 
but  I  think  the  answer  is  found  easily  enough  if  the 
theory  just  outlined  were  true.  For,  in  this  case,  we 
can  see  that  the  longer  that  sleep  is  suspended  or  post- 
poned, the  more  will  the  vibrations  of  life  be  upset, 
unequalised,  and  rendered  more  inharmonious.  We 
have  the  analogy  of  mitsic  to  guide  us  here.  We  know 
that  we  have  harmony  and  all  the  sweet  strains  of  music 
so  long  as  the  vibrations  are  equal ;  but  so  soon  as  they 
become  uiiequal  in  time-interval,  then  we  have  discord, 
or  merely  noise.  And  it  would  be  the  same  with  the 
human  mind.  The  continued  de-equalisation  of  the 
vibrations  of  life  would  tend  to  induce  more  and  more 
mental  mal- adjustment  to  the  body ;  and  hence  an 
unbalancing  of  the  mind.  Insanity,  therefore,  might 
be  defined  as  a  condition  of  the  mind  residting  from  the 
mal-adjustmcnt  and.  U7iequalising  of  the  vibration  of  life. 
It  would  result  from  the  disharmonious  connection  of  the 
mind  and  the  body — a  fact  upon  which  Andrew  Jackson 
Davis  insisted  years  ago  in  his  Mental  Disorders.^  This 
would  enable  us  to  see  why  it  is  that,  in  the  majority 

'  He  says :  "  Disturbances,  therefore,  originate  neither  in  the  matter  of 
the  body,  nor  primarily  in  the  j)rinciples  of  the  soul,  but  among  the  iinJcs, 
or  rather,  in  the  sensitive  connections  by  which  both  body  and  soul  are 
compelled  to  live  together  .  .  ."  (pp.  147-8). 


206  DEATH 

of  cases,  persons  insane  to  us  here  might  be  perfectly 
sane  so  soon  as  they  died  {i.e.  so  soon  as  they  became 
"  spirits,"  and  this  connection  consequently  no  longer 
existed).  It  would  also  enable  us  to  understand  the 
beneficial  effects  of  music  on  the  insane — which  is  now 
receiving  so  much  attention — and  the  rationale  of  the 
various  "  rest-cures "  for  mentally  sick  patients.  This 
unequalising  and  unbalancing  of  the  vibration  of  life 
would  enable  us  to  account  for  all  such  facts  very  easily, 
and  would  show  us  why  it  is  that  no  physical  disturbance 
is  to  be  found  (post-mortem)  in  a  large  number  of  insane 
patients.  We  shall  have  to  go  beyond  materialistic 
science  to  explain  many  cases  of  this  character. 


CHAPTER   X 

MY   OWN   THEORY  OF   THE   NATURE   OF   DEATH 

By  John  E.  Meader 

The  theories  that  men  advance  to  explam  the  simple 
phenomena  of  Hfe  sometimes  appeal  to  us  as  absurd, 
when,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  our  objections  to  such  ideas 
may  be  the  result  of  our  own  unfamiliarity  with  the 
mode  of  investigation,  or  processes  of  reasoning,  through 
which  they  have  been  derived.  Thus,  when  we  carry 
our  most  dogmatic  assertions  to  the  last  analysis,  we  are 
very  apt  to  discover  that  our  belief  that  this  theory  is 
false,  and  that  theory  true,  is  an  assumption  based  upon 
no  better  evidence  than  a  mere  line  of  perspective ;  and 
this  fact  applies  to  the  vaunted  wisdom  of  the  scientist, 
and  the  doctrinal  presentments  of  the  theologian,  quite 
as  appropriately  as  it  does  to  the  personal  opinions  of 
the  individual,  who — in  accordance  with  a  common, 
though  erroneous,  idea — has  no  legitimate  authority  to 
theorise  upon  very  important  subjects.  As  President 
Faunce,  of  Brown  University,  said  in  his  Commencement 
address,  June  1908  : — 

"  There  is  no  better  definition  of  dogmatism  than  that  long  ago 
given  by  the  humorist — it  is  'grown-up  puppyism.'  It  is  youthful 
presumption  ripening  into  mature  intolerance.  We  are  thoroughly 
familiar  with  this  in  religion,  but  we  often  fail  to  realise  that  it 
is  quite  as  common  in  other  realms.  Have  we  not  often  seen  a 
similar  sectarianism  in  science,  in  philosophy,  in  politics?  It  is 
precisely  the  youngest  and  least  established  sciences  .  .   .  that  are 

207 


208  DEATH 

most  tempted  to  assume  finality.  The  extraordinary  vitality  of 
the  Christian  Science  movement  of  to-day  has  come  about  mainly 
because  of  the  unwillingness  of  medicine  and  theology  even  to 
examine  the  indisputable  facts  of  mental  therapeutics.  Psycho- 
logy is  to-day  showing  a  similar  aversion  to  all  facts  which  have 
been  brought  to  light  by  the  Society  for  Psychical  Research. 
Dogmatism  is  not  the  monopoly  of  any  sect,  or  creed,  or  scientific 
theory.  It  is  the  attitude  of  the  mind  that  has  lost  its  receptivity 
and  candour,  and  has  hardened  into  premature  finality." 

My  reference  to  this  mental  attitude  of  dogmatic 
stupidity  is  neither  a  challenge  to  the  scientist  nor  an 
attack  upon  the  intelligence  of  the  theologian,  but  is 
merely  introduced  as  a  warning  note,  that  those  who 
do  not  agree  with  my  particular  theory  regarding  the 
cause  of  natural  death  may  not  be  too  ready  to  brand 
it  as  impossible  and  absurd.  To  the  dogmatic  scientist 
and  the  mentally-constricted  theologian  such  a  pre- 
caution may  be  useless,  for  when  men  are  unwilling  to 
examine  alleged  facts — however  w^ell  authenticated  they 
may  be — simply  because  they  might  possibly  tend  to 
overthrow  some  already-conceived  opinion — it  is  practi- 
cally impossible  to  appeal  to  their  sense  of  reason.  How 
often  during  the  past  hundred  years  have  revolutionary 
theories  been  dismissed  with  ridicule  by  scientists,  merely 
because  they  were  contrary  to  the  laws  of  the  inde- 
structibility of  matter  and  force,  or  the  conservation  of 
energy  and  matter !  Accepted  as  demonstrated  facts,  it 
was  generally  conceded  that  these  principles  must  be 
true,  and  an  elaborate  system  of  scientific  speculation 
based  upon  these  conditions  of  cause  and  effect  was 
constructed  with  these  laws  as  a  foundation.  And  yet, 
if  Gustavo  Le  Bon's  experiments  are  to  be  accepted — 
and  it  seems  impossible  that  even  the  most  dogmatic 
scientist  should  decline  to  accept  them — matter  is  so  far 
from  being  indestructible  and  eternal,  that,  under  certain 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  209 

conditions,  it  dissociates  and  vanishes  without  return. 
If  this  be  true,  modern  science  will  have  to  pass  through 
another  period  of  reconstruction. 

Although  science  and  theology  agree  in  opposing  every 
new  phase  of  thought  that  promises  to  be  at  all  revolu- 
tionary in  its  effect,  this  is  about  the  only  point  in  which 
they  are  in  full  accord.  Science,  for  example,  denies  the 
possibility  of  the  soul's  existence,  merely  because  it  has 
been  unable  to  discover  the  soul  by  means  of  its  instru- 
ments of  investigation ;  and  it  ridicules  the  idea  of  an 
intelligent  Creator  for  the  reason  that  it  has  been  unable 
to  put  its  finger  upon  any  particular  point  in  the  uni- 
verse and  say,  "  There  He  is."  Haeckel,  in  The  Riddle  of 
the  Universe,  facetiously  defined  God  as  a  "gaseous  verte- 
brate," and  yet  he  seriously  asks  us  to  accept,  not  only 
the  etheric  hypothesis,  but  the  statement  that  he  has 
weighed  this  unseen  medium  of  energy,  and  has  found 
that  an  amount  equal  in  bulk  to  the  dimensions  of 
this  planet  is  equivalent  in  weight  to  about  250  lbs. 
avoirdupois ! 

As  every  student  of  science  will  admit,  the  atom, 
which  was  once  regarded  as  the  ultimate  particle  of 
matter,  is  itself  unperceivable  by  any  scientific  instru- 
ment that  has  yet  been  devised.  To  say  that  the  atom  is 
composed  of  still  smaller  particles  known  as  "  electrons  " 
is,  therefore,  a  proposition  that  appeals  solely  to  the 
imagination,  and  must  be  accepted  on  faith  alone.  In 
other  words,  such  a  hypothesis  goes  beyond  the  province 
of  demonstrable  science,  and  enters  the  realm  of  pure 
metaphysical  speculation. 

Dr.  Rabagliati,  in  his  introduction  to  Vitality,  Fasting 
and  Nutrition,  by  Mr.  Carrington,  gives  due  consideration 
to  this  aspect  of  the  question. 

"Does  the  scientist,"  he  asks,  "mean  to  imply  that  'purely 
metaphysical  speculations  '  are  any  less  metaphysical  in  the  mouth 

O 


210  DEATH 

of  the  scientist  thinking  to  prove  their  truth  through  experiments, 
than  in  the  mouth  of  the  philosopher  thinking  to  prove  them  by 
reasoning  ?  The  scientist  is  on  very  dangerous  ground  if  he  does 
think  this.  He  would  realise  this  better  if  he  would  reflect  more 
about  it  and  about  the  results  of  his  experiments,  for  it  is  not  his 
experiments  that  are  important  so  much  as  the  conclusions,  always 
metaphysical,  which  he  draws  from  them.  It  is  not  so  much  facts 
and  experiments  which  sway  and  modify  us,  as  the  interpreta- 
tion of  the  same — and  the  interpretation  always  is  and  must  be 
metaphysical." 

That  is  to  say,  a  belief  in  the  existence  of  a  soul  that, 
however  intangible  it  may  seem  to  us,  may  be,  at  the 
same  time,  composed  of  very  tangible  material,  is  in  no 
respect  a  greater  strain  upon  the  intellect  than  the  theory 
that  the  absolutely  imperceptible  atom  is  composed  of 
material  of  infinitely  less  apprehensible  substance ;  and 
yet  science,  which  accepts  the  latter  hypothesis,  utterly 
denies  to  us  the  right  to  believe  in  the  former. 

Therefore,  when  we  say  that  thought  is  a  force,  or 
energy,  as  real  in  its  operation  as  the  force  that  we  know 
as  electricity,  or  as  the  absolutely  unknown  law  of 
gravitation,  most  scientists  will  accuse  us  of  the  crime 
of  exploiting  an  entirely  irrational  theory.  It  is  true 
that  materialistic  science  has  long  affirmed  that  "  thought 
is  a  function  of  the  brain  " ;  and  this  idea  had  been  so 
generally  accepted  that,  as  Professor  James  has  said, 
"  only  a  few  belated  scholastics,  or  possibly  some  crack- 
brained  theosophist  or  psychical  researcher  can  be  found 
holding  back,  and  still  talking  as  if  mental  phenomena 
might  exist  as  independent  variables  in  the  world."  If 
this  is,  or  has  been,  the  established  scientific  view,  how- 
ever, there  is  considerable  logical  reason  for  the  belief 
that  this  theory,  like  several  of  the  so-called  "  laws "  of 
science,  is  in  danger  of  serious  modification,  for  many  of 
the  most  progressive  physiologists  are  now  reaching  the 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  211 

conclusion  that  the  brain  is  nothing  more  than  an  in- 
strument ;  that  it  is  not  in  itself  the  source  or  producer 
of  thought,  but  is  merely  the  organ  through  which  the 
mind  operates. 

If  we  are  to  admit  that  this  newer  view  of  our  mental 
processes  is  in  accordance  with  fact,  we  not  only  remove 
one  of  the  most  serious  objections  to  the  existence  of  the 
soul,  but  we  provide  a  basis  for  a  hypothesis  that  will 
explain  all  the  phenomena  by  which  so-called  erratic 
thinkers  have  sought  to  verify  their  theories  of  the  close 
union  existing  between  the  force  denoted  as  "  thought " 
and  the  physical  condition  of  the  body. 

Dr.  Paul  Dubois,  of  the  University  of  Berne,  may  be 
mentioned  as  one  of  the  scientists  who  have  arrived  at 
this  conclusion,  for  while  he  is  in  no  respect  a  dogmatic 
religionist,  he  admits  that  we  must  recognise  "  the  re- 
ciprocal influence  which  the  spirit  and  the  body,  the 
moral  and  the  physical,  exert  upon  each  other."  Con- 
tinuing his  argument,  he  says  : — 

"  The  physique  of  man  is  the  entire  body,  comprising  in  it  the 
brain  with  its  thousands  of  cells  and  fibres,  with  the  organs  of 
feeling,  these  delicate  antennse  which  put  it  in  communication 
with  the  outside  world.  This  body  exists;  we  can  see  it,  can 
touch  it.  We  have  no  doubts  of  its  reality,  its  materialism,  in 
spite  of  the  specious  reasoning  of  some  philosophers  who  have 
pushed  idealism  to  the  extreme.  To  say  that  the  physical  has  an 
influence  over  the  moral  is,  then,  to  affirm  that  the  state  of  our 
body  can  modify  our  ideas,  our  sentiments,  the  condition  of  our 
soul.  Inversely,  if  we  admit  the  influence  of  the  mind  over  the 
body,  that  is  declaring  that  the  mental  representations  which  we 
make,  the  feelings  which  animate  us,  can  influence  the  body  and 
modify  the  functions  of  its  organs  "  {Influence  of  the  Mind  on  the 
Body,  pp.  4,  5).i 

1  One  case  known  to  us  is  of  extreme  interest,  since  it  illustrates  the 
possible  hold  upon  life  possessed  by  the  human  spirit,  so  long  as  con- 
sciousness and  will  are  active.     A  patient  lying  in  bed  in  a  hospital  was 


212  DEATH 

As  we  have  already  seen  in  a  previous  chapter  ("  The 
Mental  Causes  of  Death  "),  all  the  apparent  phenomena 
of  the  mind's  action  upon  the  ph3^sical  organism  ade- 
quately support  this  theory.  That  diseases  due  to  the 
imagination  are  not  necessarily  imaginary  diseases,  but, 
as  Dr.  A.  T.  Schofield  asserts/  "  may  produce  various 
functional  and  even  organic  disturbances,"  there  can  be 
no  doubt.  Then,  Dr.  Moll  succeeded  both  in  counter- 
acting the  effects  of  purgatives  by  suggestion,  and  in 
producing  this  action  of  the  bowels  by  suggesting  that 
a  cathartic  had  been  taken,  when  none  had  actually 
been  g^iven.  Dr.  Krafft-Ebins:  ^  also  describes  a  case  in 
which  a  patient  "  was  much  injured  and  offended  by  the 
culpable  act  of  a  medical  student,  who,  when  she  was  in 
a  hypnotic  condition,  laid  a  pair  of  scissors  upon  her 
chest,  telling  her  that  they  were  red-hot,  and  thus 
created  a  serious  wound,  which  took  three  months  to 
heal." 

As  these  experiments  are  in  no  way  exceptional,  they 
tend  to  explain  the  so-called  miraculous  cures  that  have 
been  reported  in  all  ages,  as  well  as  to  make  the  well- 
authenticated  cases  of  "  stigmata,''  so  generally  regarded 
as  miraculous,  appear  in  the  light   of  perfectly  natural 

fast  sinking  into  a  moribund  condition.  Consciousness  was  fast  slipping 
away,  and  it  was  quite  certain  to  the  attendant  physicians  and  nurses 
that  if  the  patient  were  not  revived  by  some  artificial  stimulus,  and 
some  mental  stimulus  at  that,  she  would  soon  become  unconscious,  and 
within  the  half-hour  would  be  dead.  The  patients  in  the  remaining  beds 
of  the  ward  were  warned  not  to  be  alarmed  whatever  occurred,  and  four 
nurses  quietly  posted  themselves  at  the  four  corners  of  the  patient's  bed. 
At  a  given  signal,  just  as  this  patient  was  losing  hold  of  life  and  passing 
into  an  unconscious  state,  the  four  nurses  simultaneously  shrieked  at  the 
tops  of  their  voices,  and  forcibly  wheeled  the  patient's  bed  out  into  the 
centre  of  the  ward.  The  result  was  a  start  or  shock  to  the  consciousness 
of  the  patient.  The  impetus  was  all  that  was  required  to  revive  in 
our  patient  consciousness  and  an  interest  in  life.  From  that  moment 
she  improved,  and  within  two  months  was  discharged  from  the  hospital 
cured. 

^  Nerves  in  Disorder,  p.  6. 

2  Hypnotism,  p.  12'.). 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  213 

phenomena;  for  while  it  is  true  that  many  scientists, 
like  Virchow,  have  thought  that  there  were  but  two 
possible  explanations  of  such  a  physical  condition — that 
if  it  was  not  the  result  of  "  fraud,"  it  must  have  been 
a  "  miracle  " — Dr.  Moll  has  shown,  in  the  case  of  Louise 
Lateau,  of  Bois  d'Haine,  near  Mons,  France,  that,  when 
she  directed  her  whole  attention  "  continually  to  the 
wounds  of  Christ,"  the  "  anatomical  lesions  resulted  from 
this  strain  of  attention,  as  in  other  cases  from  external 
suggestion." 

While  it  has  been  demonstrated  that  hypnotic  sug- 
/  gestion  is  capable  of  exerting  a  most  pronounced  physical 
effect  upon  the  bodily  organism,  there  are  as  many 
cases — even  excluding  that  of  the  "  stigmata  " — that 
prove  that  every  mental  process  has  a  corresponding 
action  upon  the  physique,  even  when  that  suggestion  is 
apparently  automatically  produced.  To  illustrate,  it  is 
only  necessary  to  refer  again  to  the  many  cases  recorded 
in  the  section  of  this  work  on  "  The  Mental  Causes  of 
Death,"  or  to  cite  Dr.  Hack  Tuke's  well-known  case 
where  an  infant  was  poisoned,  and  died,  as  the  result  of 
the  effect  of  anger  upon  the  mother's  milk. 

It  may  be  thought  by  some  that  I  have  devoted  far 
too  much  attention  to  this  preliminary  argument  in 
support  of  my  own  theory  of  the  nature  of  death ;  but 
when  I  state  that  I  am  personally  convinced  that  natural 
death  is  a  habit  to  Avhich  man  has  become  addicted 
through  countless  centuries  of  anticipatory  suggestion, 
the  necessity  of  leading  up  to  such  a  theory  by  some- 
what slow  argumentative  stages  may  become  apparent. 
To  understand  this  theory,  it  is  first  necessary  to  realise 
that  our  present  scientific  conceptions  of  the  phenomena 
of  life  are  in  no  respect  infallible ;  that  they  change,  like 
our  views  upon  other  questions,  as  our  horizon  widens 
and  we  become  better  acquainted  with  the  laws  governing 


214  DEATH 

our  being.  /  It  is  also  requisite  that  we  should  know 
that  the  mind  is  not  only  independent  of  the  brain, 
operating  through  it  as  an  instrument,  just  as  the  sense 
of  sight  makes  use  of  the  organ  known  as  the  eye,  but 
we  must  also  understand  that  there  is  so  close  a 
bond  between  the  mental  and  the  physical  elements  of 
the  human  organism,  that  each  exerts  a  demonstrable 
effect  upon  the  other.  With  so  much  determined,  it 
becomes  possible  to  present  the  arguments  for  such 
a  theory  Avith  less  danger  of  making  it  appear  as  the 
product  of  irrational,  if  not  absolutely  erratic,  reasoning. 
Of  course,  I  do  not  mean  to  imply  that  all  death  is 
purely  a  matter  of  habit.  Death  from  disease,  or  from 
accident,  would  occur  under  any  conditions ;  nor  do  I 
wish  the  reader  to  infer  that  the  habit  of  dying  is  one 
from  which  we  can  break  ourselves  at  any  time.  Such 
assertions  would  be  a  test  of  sanity  to  which  I  should 
not  care  to  subject  myself.  But  I  do  admit  that,  in  my 
opinion,  the  physical  body  possesses  the  means  of  length- 
ening life  within  its  own  organism,  and  to  this  extent  I 
am  supported  by  some  eminent  medical  authorities. 
For  example.  Dr.  William  A.  Hammond  admits  that 
"  there  is  no  physiological  reason  why  man  should  die," 
and  to  this  Dr.  Thomas  J.  Allen  agrees,  adding :  "  The 
human  body  is  not  like  a  machine  which  must  wear  out 
by  constant  disintegration,  for  it  is  self-renewing."  It  is 
to  this  fact  that  Harry  Gaze  refers,  in  his  book  How  to 
Live  Forever,  when  he  says : — 

"  As  natural  activity  does  not  wear  away  the  body,  but  simply 
brings  a  change,  so  man  is  not  made  old  by  normal  changes.  .  .  . 
The  centenarian  and  the  little  child  are  both  continually  building  the 
body  from  equally  new  food  and  material.  The  mental  conditions, 
however,  are  very  different,  and  determine  the  great  difference 
that  is  manifested.  The  centenarian  thinks  that  his  body  is  one 
hundred  years  old,  while  the  child  believes  his  body  to  be  but  a  few 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  215 

years  old.  Neither  is  correct.  The  human  body  cannot  exist  for 
centuries,  or  even  for  years.  The  body  of  the  centenarian,  which 
seems  to  be  very  old,  in  reality  is  new.  .  .  .  The  fact  that  the 
body  is  incessantly  changing  demonstrates  that  old  age  is  not 
caused  by  the  passing  of  years,  but  by  a  lack  of  proper 
adjustment." 

As  we  well  know — for  this  is  a  scientific  fact  and  not 
a  mere  theory — the  changes  in  the  material  of  which 
the  human  body  is  composed  continue  ceaselessly.  The 
body  that  we  have  to-day  is  in  no  sense  the  same  body 
that  we  are  to  possess  a  foAv  years  from  this  time. 
Every  day  the  process  of  the  rejection  of  waste  and  the 
renewal  of  tissue  continues,  and  it  is  only  logical  to 
assume  that  the  various  phenomena  which  we  call 
"  old  age,"  and  the  final  disintegration  that  attends  upon 
natural  death,  could,  even  at  this  time,  be  long  post- 
poned if  we  could  succeed  in  effecting  a  perfect  balance 
between  the  process  of  elimination  and  that  of  renewal 
of  tissue.  Moreover,  as  every  logical  argument  seems  to 
indicate,  the  destructive  element  that  produces  physical 
decay  may  be  traced  directly  or  indirectly  to  the  mind. 

It  has  been  objected  to  this  theory  that,  while  it  explains 
death,  as  viewed  and  found  in  the  human  race,  it  does 
not  explain  the  death  of  animals,  insects,  and  plants. 
Are  we  to  suppose  that  they  too  possess  mind  enough  to 
bring  about  their  own  extinction  ?  Or  is  it  not  rather 
the  result  of  some  organic  and  natural  cause — inevitable, 
and  consequent  upon  some  purely  physical,  as  distinct 
from  psychical,  cause  ? 

It  must  not  be  thought  that  I  have  been  unmindful 
of  this  objection;  or  that  I  intend  to  disregard  it.  It  is 
a  serious  objection  to  the  theory,  and  indeed,  were  it  not 
for  the  considerations  I  propose  below,  might  be  said  to 
disprove  it,  and  the  whole  theory  might  thus  be  held  up 
to   ridicule.     But  there  is  an   answer  to  this   objection, 


216  DEATH 

which  renders  it  quite   ineffective,   and  which,  I   think, 
conchisively  disposes  of  the  argument.     It  is  this : — 

If  this  objection  is  to  have  due  Aveight,  it  must  be 
shown  that  the  modes  of  death  are  the  same  in  the  two 
cases ;  and  what  evidence  is  there  of  this  ?  Need  we 
suppose  that  the  nature  of  the  death  of  plants  and  the 
lower  animals  is  necessarily  like  that  of  man  ?  If  this 
objection  is  to  have  due  force,  it  must  be  shown  that  the 
kind  of  life  is  also  similar  in  the  two  cases — for  death 
has  most  often  been  defined — as  we  have  seen — as  the 
cessation  of  life.  And  if  the  life,  or  the  principle  of  life, 
be  different  in  the  two  cases,  what  evidence  is  there  that 
the  process  of  death  is  the  same  ?  Perhaps  the  question 
may  be  raised — whether  the  life  is  so  different  in  the 
two  cases;  but  on  this  point  I  am  glad  to  be  able  to 
quote  so  eminent  an  authority  as  Professor  C.  Lloyd 
Morgan,  the  eminent  English  biologist,  who,  writing  in 
his  Habit  and  Instinct,  says  :  — 

"  It  is  probable  that,  tliroughout  the  vegetable  kingdom,  evolu- 
tion is  merely  in  the  organic  phase.  If  there  is  consciousness 
associated  with  the  life  of  plants,  there  is  no  evidence  of  its  being 
a  factor  in  the  process  of  development.  It  is  not  what  we  have 
termed  before  effective  consciousness.  The  lowest  animals  fall 
under  the  same  category ;  but  where  is  the  line  to  be  drawn  in  the 
animal  kingdom,  between  those  in  which  consciousness,  if  present, 
is  inoperative,  and  those  in  which  it  is  effective,  who  can  say  with 
any  certainty?  .  .  .  We  must  be  particular  to  note  the  subservient 
position  which  mental  evolution  holds  in  the  life  of  animals  .  .  ." 
(pp.  263,  333). 

It  will  be  seen  that  Professor  Morgan  is  careful  to  em- 
phasise the  comparative  unimportance  of  consciousness, 
as  a  factor  of  evolution  in  the  vegetable  and  lower 
animal  world,  and  its  great  influence  in  the  higher 
animal    realm.     Consciousness,    that    is,    actively    tends 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  217 

to  shape  the  destiny  of  the  higher  animals,  while  it 
has  but  little  effect  in  the  lower  planes  of  activity. 
Nevertheless,  we  have  only  to  threaten  certain  insects 
with  death,  to  bring  about  a  complete  cessation  of  their 
vital  functions.  This  would  seem  to  indicate  that  there 
is  probably  more  directly  psychic  life  than  is  commonly 
supposed.  It  also  serves  to  indicate  the  tremendous 
power  of  the  mind,  even  in  such  lowly  forms  of  life,  to 
cause  death.  The  type  of  life,  and  the  manner  in  which 
the  life  was  formed,  is  different  in  the  two  cases. 
And  if  the  kind  or  character  of  life  is  different,  it  is 
probable — nay,  certain — that  the  mode  of  death  would 
be  different  also  ;  for,  as  we  have  seen,  death  has  always 
been  defined  as  the  cessation  of  life.  And,  if  the  manner 
of  upbuilding  life  be  different  in  the  two  cases,  it  is 
probable,  and  this  amounts  almost  to  a  certainty,  that 
the  method  of  its  destruction  or  withdrawal  would  be 
different  also — that  is,  the  manner  of  death  would  he  different 
in  the  two  cases.  The  psychic  life,  which  plays  so  im- 
portant a  part  in  the  evolution  of  man,  and  so  large  a 
part  of  his  life,  while  here,  must  surely  play  an  im- 
portant part  in  his  death  also.  The  life  of  plants  and 
the  lower  animals  would  probably  die  in  an  entirely 
different  manner ;  ^  that  factor  which  had  proved  so 
important  in  the  upbuilding  and  destruction  of  man — 
consciousness — would  probably  be  almost  a  negligible 
quantity  in  the  case  of  the  lower  forms  of  life.  Their 
death  would  be  largely  a  matter  of  physical  conditions 
and  surroundings ;  while  man's  death  would  depend 
largely  for  its  fulfilment — as  does  his  evolution  and 
condition  while  here — upon  his  mind — the  form  and 
content  of  his  conscious  and  subconscious  life. 


1  "  The  death  of  organisms  is  capable  of  teaching  us  something  as  to 
their  life ;  their  mode  of  dying  is  typical  of  their  mode  of  living.  The 
more  highly  developed  an  organism  has  become,  the  more  has  specialisa- 


218  DEATH 

If  Weismann's  theory  were  correct,^  and  the  first 
animal  organism  possessed  the  qualities  of  physical  im- 
mortality, it  would  be  easy  to  imagine  how  the  present 
element  of  mortality  came  into  the  world,  and  by  what 
means  it  has  been  transmitted  to  the  present  time,  for 
it  is  not  necessary  to  go  back  on  the  law  of  heredity  to 
discover  a  comprehensive  explanation  of  the  phenomena 
which  we  call  "  death." 

In  the  valuable  little  book  from  which  I  have  already 
quoted.  Professor  Dubois  considers  this  phase  of  heredity. 
"  By  the  fact  of  heredity  and  of  atavism,"  he  says, 
"  we  are  born  already  influenced  in  a  certain  direction ; 
we  enter  this  world  more  or  less  well  endowed.  This 
is  a  heritage  which  we  are  obliged  to  accept." 

While  Professor  Dubois  introduces  this  statement  to 
explain  the  different  manifestation  of  brain  development 
in  various  individuals,  it  may  be  applied  with  equal 
force  to  the  disintegrating  effect  of  the  mental  fear,  or 
expectation  of  death.  We  know,  from  many  authori- 
ties, that  the  emotion  of  worry  exerts  just  such  a  de- 
pressing influence  upon  the  bodily  organism,  and  that, 
if  the  habit  of  worrying  be  continued,  or  the  emotion  of 
anxiety  becomes  chronic,  death  is  the  natural  and,  I 
might  add,  the  inevitable  result.     We   know,  too,    that 

tion  been  brought  about  in  the  functions  of  its  several  parts,  and  (in 
almost  the  same  proportion)  the  more  has  the  all  become  welded  into  a 
whole.  The  greater  the  degree  of  interdependence  existing  between  the 
actions  of  its  several  parts,  the  more  is  the  well-being  of  the  entire 
organism  interfered  with  by  damage  occurring  to  any  one  of  these 
special  parts.  Through  the  intervention,  for  the  most  part,  of  the 
nervous  system  and  vascular  system,  this  individuality  of  the  entire 
organism  is  carried  to  the  most  marked  extent  in  the  highest  vertebrata, 
so  that  the  life  of  one  of  these  creatures — regarded  as  a  whole,  or  sum- 
total  of  phenomena — differs  almost  as  widely  as  it  is  possible  from  that  of 
some  of  the  lowest  animals  on  the  one  hand,  and  from  the  plants  on  the 
other.  Their  mode  of  death  also  is  quite  difierent.  And  as  with  life,  so 
with  death  ;  we  are  perhaps  too  apt  to  form  our  notions  concerning  each 
from  what  we  see  taking  place  in  man  himself  and  in  the  higher  living 
things." — Bastian,  The  Beginuings  of  Life,  vol.  i.,  p.  108. 

^  See  Chapter  I.,  "  The  Scientific  Aspect  of  Life  and  Death." 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  21^\ 

fear,   anger,   and   humiliation    will   kill   as   certainly,    in      \ 
extreme    conditions,    as    the    most   deadly   poison ;  and, 
if  these   facts  be  true,   in   what  respect  is  it  irrational 
to  suppose  that  the  knowledge  of  the  absolute  certainty     /    . 
of  death  which  we  have  inherited  from  countless  genera-      ^    ' 
tions  of  ancestors  who  have  died,  when  added  to  our 
own  experience,  should  produce  the  depressing  conditions 
that   would   make    the  continuance  of  life  beyond    the  / 
customary  period  of  existence  practically  impossible  ? 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  mental  characteristics 
of  all  kinds  are  transmitted  from  generation  to  gene- 
ration by  heredity.  Ribot,  in  his  Heredity,  brings 
together  a  great  mass  of  material  upon  this  subject, 
and  has  shown  us  that  not  only  our  instincts  and  bodily 
traits  are  hereditary,  but  that  such  complicated  psycho- 
logical characteristics  as  touch,  sight,  hearing,  smell  and 
taste,  memory,  imagination,  intellectual  ability,  sentiment, 
passions,  will,  national  character — such  as  those  of  the 
Jews,  Gypsies,  &c. — morbid  psychological  characteristics, 
— such  as  tendency  to  hallucination,  suicide,  homicide, 
hypochondria,  mania,  dementia,  general  paralysis,  &c. — 
all  these  are  hereditary. 

If  such  traits  and  characteristics  can  be  transmitted, 
surely  it  is  but  reasonable  to  believe  that  the  instinct 
of  death  might  be  transmitted  also — the  anticipation  or 
expectation  of  it  particularly,  as  this  is  supplemented  by 
constant  suggestions  from  without  during  the  life  of  the 
individual,  and  hence  would  form  part  of  his  environment 
and  education.  Further,  in  order  to  form  any  intelligent 
conception  of  the  modus  operandi  of  heredity,  one  must 
always  assume  that  the  purely  psychological  character- 
istics are  associated  with,  if  not  dependent  upon,  bodily 
structure  of  peculiarities  of  a  certain  type,  so  that  we 
would  inherit,  as  it  were,  a  physiological  instinct  for  death, 
just  as  we  should  the  psychological  attitude  towards  it. 


220  DEATH 

That  the  food  we  eat,  the  air  we  breathe,  and  our 
obedience  to  all  other  hygienic  laws,  are  matters  that 
have  an  important  bearing  in  perfecting  the  adjustment 
of  physical  conditions  is  a  fact  that  requires  no  re-asser- 
tion ;  and  yet,  while  the  violation  of  natural  laws  might 
be  quite  sufficient  to  cause  death,  our  obedience  to  such 
laws  does  not  alone  enable  us  to  lengthen  life  far  beyond 
the  customary  span.  Thus  the  animal,  who  does  not 
reason  as  we  do,  and  who  probably  has  little  if  any  idea 
of  the  imminence  of  death,  dies  of  old  age,  owing  to  the 
gradual  cessation  of  the  normal  functions  of  the  organism 
due  to  improper  adjustment  of  both  body  and  mind. 
Dr.  Graham,  in  the  Science  of  Hitman  Life,  explains  this 
by  saying  that  "  the  vital  constitution  itself  wears  out," 
or  that  "  the  ultimate  powers  of  the  living  organs,  on 
w^hich  their  replenishing  and  renovating  capabilities 
depend,  are,  under  the  most  favourable  circumstances, 
gradually  expended  and  finally  exhausted." 

Admitting  all  this  to  be  true — admitting,  even  that 
the  vital  constitution  does  "  wear  out " — is  there  any 
reason  to  presume  that,  in  the  case  of  man  at  least, 
it  is  not  the  action  of  the  mind  that  is  one  of  the  direct 
causes  of  this  deterioration  of  the  bodily  functions  ?  It 
is  apparent  from  the  fact  that  the  body  possesses  the 
faculty  of  renewing  itself  continually — casting  off  all 
useless  tissue  and  supplying  new  tissue  to  take  its  place 
— that  man  was  not  constructed  to  go  to  pieces  after 
such  a  brief  period  of  life.  In  fact,  as  Dr.  Gregory,  in 
his  Medical  Conspectns,  wrote :  "  Such  a  machine  as  the 
human  frame,  unless  accidentally  depraved,  or  injured 
by  some  external  cause,  would  seem  formed  for  per- 
petuity." If  there  is  some  element  that  makes  this 
frame  wear  out,  therefore,  it  is  only  logical  that  we 
should  look  for  it  somewhere  else  than  in  the  actual 
physical   organism   itself,   and,   realising   as   we   do,    the 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  221 

effect  of  thought  processes  upon  the  body,  to  what  point 
would  it  be  more  reasonable  to  turn  in  search  of  this 
disintegrating  influence  than  to  the  mind  ?  We  have 
seen  that  it  is  possible  for  an  individual  to  worry  him- 
self to  death.  It  has  been  proved  that  other  emotions 
slay.  By  what  law  of  logical  reasoning  are  we  forbidden 
to  presume  that  a  fear  of  death  that  has  become  innate 
in  man  through  countless  manifestations  of  the  law  of 
heredity  should  not  be  able  to  produce  death — irre- 
spective of  other  causes — at  the  approximately  appointed 
time  ?  Is  it  not  entirely  reasonable  to  believe  that  old 
age  and  death  are  actually  "  founded  on  misconceptions 
due  to  ignorance  of  the  simple  laws  of  being ; "  that  the 
secret  of  immortal  youth  is  not  to  be  found  in  any 
patent  nostrum  or  hidden  spring,  but  that  it  can  come 
alone  through  our  conscious  co-operation  with  these  natural 
changes  ?  In  other  words,  to  refer  to  Gaze  once  more, 
"  consciously  to  perpetuate  existence  is  to  manifest  fresh 
vitality  by  the  constant  conception  and  realisation  of  new 
ideas  of  growth." 
^  Although  somewhat  less  radical  in  some  respects, 
/  Professor  Dubois'  doctrine  is  always  pregnant  with  this 
I  same  truth — that  a  healthy  mind  is  most  conducive  to' 
the  health  of  the  body.  He,  too,  appreciates  the  danger 
of  permitting  the  thought-force  to  assert  its  depressing 
effect  upon  the  human  organism.     Thus,  he  says  : — 

"  When  we  have  arrived  at  the  age  of  reason,  personal  education 
begins,  and  our  greatest  task  is  to  retain  command  over  ourselves. 
It  is  necessary,  above  all,  for  one  to  believe  in  his  good  health, 
and  his  power  to  resist  morally  as  well  as  physically.  As  soon  as 
a  man  believes  himself  to  be  ill,  he  is  so.  He  is  not  only  so  in 
imagination — he  becomes  so  really,  physically. 

"All  those  which  have  been  justly  called  the  unhappy  passions 
— fear,  inquietude,  discouragement,  anger — lower  the  nervous 
tension    and,    as    all    organs    work    under    the    influence    of    the 


222  DEATH 

nervous   system,  they   can   all   suffer   from    the   rebound   of   our 
moral  feebleness. 

"  We  must  take  literally  the  popular  expression  to  improve  bad 
blood,  or,  on  the  contrary,  to  improve  good  blood.  When  one  is 
gay,  contented ;  when  one  is  able  to  believe  fully  in  his  good 
health,  the  circulation  improves,  the  nutritious  exchanges  are 
accelerated,  and  the  human  machine  works  harmoniously.  On 
the  contrary,  when  one  doubts  his  strength,  it  diminishes,  and  all 
the  organs  manifest  functional  trouble,  as  in  an  electric  circuit 
where  all  the  lamps  burn  badly  because  the  current  has  lost  its 
force." 

We  must  admit,  if  our  own  personal  experiences  have 
been  of  any  service  to  us  in  teaching  us  the  lessons  of 
life,  that  these  facts  are  absolutely  true.  Even  in  the 
matter  of  personal  or  material  success,  the  introduction 
of  the  disquieting  elements  of  fear — discouragement,  or 
lack  of  confidence  in  ourselves  or  our  purpose — is  certain 
to  nullify  our  efforts  as  completely  as  though  it  was  our 
physical  organism  that  had  refused  to  respond  to  the 
demands  upon  it.  Inquietude,  anxiety,  and  all  other 
"  unhapi^y  passions  " — as  Dubois  calls  them — produce  a 
correspondingly  similar  effect.  If  we  want  to  enjoy  the 
blessings  of  health  and  happiness — the  joys  of  living,  in 
fact — Ave  must  keep  the  mind  in  the  right  humour,  for 
it  is  just  as  impossible  to  derive  healthy  thoughts  from 
a  diseased,  abnormal,  or  otherwise  unhealthy  mind,  as  it 
is  to  produce  a  harmonious  operation  of  the  physical 
organism  when  most  of  the  mechanism  is  out  of  order. 
Thus  Dr.  Sweetser  says : — 

"  The  mind  is  never  agitated  by  any  strong  emotion  without  a 
sensible  change  immediately  ensuing  in  some  one  or  more  of  the 
vital  phenomena,  and  which,  according  to  its  nature,  or  the  cir- 
cumstances under  which  it  occurs,  may  be  either  morbid  or 
sanative  in  its  effects,  in  the  same  manner  as  in  the  action  of 
strictly  physical  agents — the  various  medicaments,   for  example. 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH    223 

Mental  emotions,  when  curative,  operate  mostly,  it  is  to  be  supposed, 
on  that  principle  generally  admitted  in  medical  science  called  revul- 
sion ;  that  is,  by  calling  forth  new  and  ascendant  actions  in  the 
animal  economy,  they  repress  or  destroy  the  distempered  ones 
already  existing.  It  is  no  more  strange,  then,  that  the  passions 
should,  through  their  influence  on  our  physical  organisation,  be 
capable  of  engendering  or  subduing  morbid  phenomena,  than  that 
agents,  essentially  material  in  their  nature,  should  j)ossess  such 
powers." 

As  the  reader  will  undoubtedly  note,  this  is  a  remark- 
ably clear  and  comprehensive  explanation  of  the  process 
by  which  it  is  possible  for  the  mind  to  act  in  breaking 
down  the  balance  of  adjustment  upon  which  the  health 
of  the  body  and  the  duration  of  life  depend.  In  a  per- 
fectly healthy  body  this  equilibrium  between  the  vivifying 
and  the  destructive  forces  would  naturally  attain  perfec- 
tion, but  how  many  of  us  know  what  it  means  to  enjoy 
really  perfect  health  ?  Many  writers  admit  that  perfect 
health  at  the  present  day,  among  civilised  nations,  is 
probably  nowhere  to  be  found,  and  while  this  condition 
is  undoubtedly  due  to  the  fact  that  we,  as  a  race,  are 
addicted  to  most  unwise  habits  of  living,  it  is  wrong  to 
surmise  that  our  disobedience  to  the  laws  of  life  is  the 
only  influence  that  operates  upon  this  balance  of  the  vital 
forces.  If  we  eat  too  much  and  exercise  too  little ;  if 
we  select  the  wrong  kinds  of  food,  and  consume  it  in  an 
improper  manner ;  if  we  neglect  our  sleep,  or  live  in  con- 
ditions of  filth — all  these  circumstances  will  have  a  de- 
teriorating effect  upon  the  tissues.  But,  even  admitting 
that  we  attain  to  an  ideal  mode  of  living,  so  far  as 
physical  conditions  are  concerned,  all  this  will  be  of  no 
avail  in  the  lengthening  of  life,  unless  a  corresponding 
equilibrium  of  the  mental  balance  is  also  maintained. 
That  is  to  say,  the  mentft"  processes  exert  sufficient 
influence   upon   the   body   to    nullify  the   effect   of  an 


224  DEATH 

merely  physical  habits,  however  estimable  they  may  be 
in  themselves.  It  is  this  circumstance  that  explains  the 
fact  that  so  many  persons  live  to — what  seems  to  us — 
an  exceptional  age  in  spite  of  habits  that  would  ordinarily 
be  expected  to  shorten  life  materially.  But  this  is  the 
secret  of  their  longevity :  although  they  may  abuse  the 
physical  organism,  they  maintain  the  quietude  and 
cheerful  qualities  of  the  mind,  and  the  stability  of 
this  mental  balance  offsets,  to  a  large  degree  at  least, 
the  disintegrating  action  which  their  bad  physical  habits 
would  otherwise  exhibit  in  the  operation  of  the  bodily 
functions. 

Fresh  evidence  in  support  of  this  theory  has  recently 
been  forthcoming.  In  his  Philoso'phy  of  Long  Life,  M.  Jean 
Finot  devotes  a  number  of  pages  to  a  consideration  of  the 
problem  :  "  Will  as  a  means  of  prolonging  life."  He  says 
in  part : — 

"  The  forces  of  the  mind,  well  utilised,  may  render  us  most  im- 
portant services  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  prolongation  of  life, 
as  we  have  demonstrated  elsewhere.  It  is  suggestion  ill- employed 
which  undoubtedly  shortens  it.  Arrived  at  a  certain  age,  we  drug 
ourselves  with  the  idea  of  the  approaching  end.  We  lose  faith  in 
our  powers,  and  they  abandon  us.  Under  the  pretext  of  the  weight 
of  age  upon  our  shoulders  we  take  on  sedentary  habits.  We  cease 
to  busy  ourselves  actively  with  our  occupations.  Little  by  little  our 
blood,  vitiated  by  idleness,  together  with  our  ill-renewed  tissues, 
opens  the  door  to  all  kinds  of  diseases.  Premature  old  age  attacks 
us,  and  we  succumb  sooner  than  we  need  in  consequence  of  a 
harmful  auto-suggestion. 

"  Let  us  try  to  live  by  auto-suggestion  instead  of  dying  by  it.  .  .  . 
Evil  suggestions  surround  us  on  all  sides.  .  .  .  Just  as  the  hypo- 
chondriac begins  to  beam  with  happiness  by  continually  repeating 
that  he  is  gay,  so  persons  obsessed  by  the  thought  of  old  age  and 
death  will  think  calmly  of  their  approach.  The  unreasoning  fear 
of  them,  by  demoralising  their  consciousness,  only  quickens  their 
destroying  march.     Man,  arrived  at  a  certain  age,  or  even  at  a 


MY  OWN  THEORY  OF  NATURE  OF  DEATH  225 

certain  mental  state,  undergoes  a  sort  of  auto-suggestion  of  death. 
He  then  believes  himself  to  have  reached  the  end  of  his  days,  and 
feeds  as  much  on  the  fear  of  death  as  on  daily  foods.  From  this 
moment  onwards  death  fascinates  him.  He  hears  its  call  with 
terror  everywhere  and  always.  The  philosophic  and  salutary  con- 
sciousness of  a  hereafter  gives  place  to  a  cowardly  and  nervous  fear 
of  separation  from  life.  The  victim  feeds  upon  this  fear,  intoxicates 
himself  with  it,  and  dies  of  it !  " 

While  these  facts  are  true — and  can  be  demonstrated 
to  be  true — and  while  it  is  difficult  to  comprehend  why 
anybody  should  object  to  this  theory  as  a  plausible  expla- 
nation of  the  phenomena  of  so-called  natural  death,  I 
still  believe  that  the  presentation  of  these  ideas  will  be  of 
advantage  to  the  world,  whether  my  ultimate  conclusions 
are  finally  accepted  or  rejected.  While  most  theories 
that  men  have  devised  to  explain  the  phenomena  of 
life  and  death  appeal  to  the  intellect  alone,  this  theory 
which  I  have  attempted  to  elucidate  cannot  fail  to  exert 
a  far  deeper  effect,  if  any  of  its  basic  principles  are  ac- 
cepted. Thus,  if  we  believe  that  the  "  unhappy  passions  " 
or  emotions  are  both  physically  and  mentally  inju- 
rious to  us,  it  is  but  natural  to  suppose  that  we  should 
endeavour  to  bring  them  under  better  control.  If  we 
agree  that  quietude  of  mind,  cheerfulness  of  thought,  and 
the  attitude  of  love  and  charity  towards  all  mankind  will 
have  a  tendency  to  improve  our  physical  health,  increase 
our  happiness,  and,  finally,  add  to  the  number  of  our 
days,  the  mere  recognition  of  the  existence  of  these  laws 
of  life  would  inevitably  tend  to  inspire  the  ambition  to 
obey  them.  In  other  words,  whereas  other  theories  are 
purely  intellectual  in  their  aspect — speculative  concep- 
tions of  conditions  that  could  have  little,  if  any,  effect 
upon  the  actual  life,  whether  they  were  or  were  not  true 
— the  principles  that  I  have  suggested  constitute  a  prac- 
tical law  of  sane  living,  which,  if  adopted,  would  not  only 

p 


226  DEATH 

add  materially  to  the  comfort  and  pleasure  of  this  exist- 
ence but  could  not  fail  to  bring  our  mental  processes  to 
that 'degree  of  adjustment  which  would  best  fit  us  to  enter 
upon  the  experiences  of  a  hfe  beyond  the  grave,  whatever 
such  conditions  might  be. 


CHAPTER  XI 

ON  THE   POSSIBLE  UNIFICATION  OF   OUR  THEORIES 

To  any  one  who  has  read  through  the  theories  of  death 
that  we  have  advanced,  it  will  be  obvious  that,  although 
they  are  widely  divergent  in  certain  respects,  they  yet 
approach  one  another  very  closely  in  other  ways^ — and 
that,  were  each  of  us  willing  to  make  certain  concessions 
to  the  other,  it  might  be  possible  to  unify  these  theories, 
and  so  bring  into  harmony  the  two  aspects  of  the  problem 
— which,  it  will  be  seen,  we  have  attacked  from  opposite 
sides — one  from  the  physical  or  physiological,  the  other 
from  the  psychological,  point  of  view.  Now,  it  has  gener- 
ally been  found  possible,  in  the  history  of  psychology,  to 
form  some  monistic  conception  of  the  facts,  which  oppo- 
site schools  have  been  in  the  habit  of  discussing  from 
their  respective  standpoints.  One  school,  for  example, 
would  discuss  mental  facts  in  purely  psychological  lan- 
guage ;  the  other  school  would  discuss  these  same  facts 
in  physiological  language ;  but,  after  all,  it  has  generally 
been  found  possible  to  unify  the  divergent  views,  and  to 
find  that,  upon  closer  analysis,  they  were  really  arguing 
about  the  same  facts  after  all.  Both  beheld  the  same 
shield,  to  use  an  old  analogy,  but  were  looking  at  opposite 
sides.     It  may  be  the  same  here  ! 

It  will  be  evident  to  any  one  reading  Mr.  Header's 
theory  of  death,  that  he  considers  the  mind  all-powerful, 
and  that  which  is  capable  of  inducing  natural  death 
alone,  and  practically  unaided  by  any  other  physiological 

227 


228  DEATH 

causes.  Mr.  Carrington,  on  the  contrary,  while  allowing  a 
place  for  mental  causes  of  death,  considers  them,  it  would 
appear,  of  secondary  importance.  In  this  connection  we 
desire  to  discuss  only  natural  death,  or  death  from  old 
acife ;  since  the  authors  are  in  virtual  ao^reement  as  to  the 
cause  of  death  from  accident,  shock,  disease,  or  other 
causes  of  a  like  nature.  It  remains  for  us,  therefore,  to 
consider  merely  the  question  of  "  natural "  death. 

Let  us  first  of  all  remind  the  reader  of  Mr.  Carrins^ton's 
definition  of  death,  as  put  forward  in  his  chapter  on  the 
theory  of  its  causation.  It  is :  "  The  inability  of  the  life 
force  to  raise  to  the  requisite  rate  of  vibration  the  nervous 
tissue  upon  which  it  acts — its  manifestation  thus  being 
rendered  impossible." 

While  this  may  be  the  true  definition  of  the  physical 
aspect  of  death,  as  it  were — that  is,  of  the  inability  actively 
to  manifest  life  into  the  material  world — it  only  states 
the  primary  cause  of  this  inability.  Mr.  Carrington  stated 
that  this  might  be  due  either  (1)  to  the  condition  of  the 
body,  or  (2)  the  state  of  the  mind.  Mr.  Header  has 
called  attention  to  the  interesting  fact  that,  no  matter 
how  well  at  present,  physically,  the  body  may  be,  or  how 
great  care  be  taken  of  it,  there  comes  a  time,  never- 
theless, when  natural  death  takes  place,  in  spite  of  all  our 
efforts  to  preserve  it — that  is,  although  we  may,  by  care- 
ful living,  and  by  following  the  laws  of  hygiene,  extend 
our  lives  from  fifty  to  one  hundred  years,  there  comes  a 
time,  nevertheless,  when  all  must  die. 

Now,  if  we  could  conceive  (what  is  no  great  strain  upon 
the  imagination)  that  the  depressed  mental  states — the 
expectancy  of  death  and  other  psychological  attitudes, 
acquired  or  hereditary — would  correspond  to  a  greatly 
lowered  rate  of  the  vibration  of  life,  it  might  be  possible 
to  unify  our  theories.  For,  it  will  be  seen,  by  depressed 
mental  conditions — by  anticipation,   worry,  fear,  expec- 


POSSIBLE  UNIFICATION  OF  THEORIES     229 

tancy  of  death,  &c. — (all  largely  subconscious,  perhaps) 
we  lower  thereby  the  rate  of  this  vibration — until  it 
is  no  longer  possible  for  life  to  become  manifest.  It  is 
not  maintained  at  the  minimum  standard  required  by 
nature  for  the  preservation  of  life ;  mental  stimuli,  in  the 
form  of  hope,  faith,  anticipation,  and  the  assurance  of 
continued  living,  &c.,  would  stimulate  into  activity  a 
greater  fund  of  the  reserve  of  life,  and  would  render  its 
continuation  possible ;  and,  if  these  stimuli  were  not 
forthcoming,  life  would  flutter  out  and  become  extinct. 

One  objection — a  very  practical  one — will  be  raised  to 
this  theory.     It  is  this  :  That  no  matter  what  man  may 
do  or  think,  he  does  ultimately  die  as  a  matter  of  fact. 
This  would  be  due  to  a  combination  of  two  causes.     In 
the  first  place,  he  would  have  inherited  the  psychological 
tendencies   and  characteristics  which  rendered  his  sub- 
conscious anticipation  of  death  necessary.     On  the  other 
hand,  the  physiological  alterations  going  on  in  his  body 
would   render    difficult   the   continued   existence   of   life 
within  it.      Perfect  health,  as  before  pointed  out,  is  an 
ideal  condition,  not  an  actual  one  ;  and  every  one  is  in  a 
more    or    less   diseased   state   throughout   his   life — and 
especially  is  this  the  case  in  old  age.     On  any  theory, 
life    has    to    manifest   through   and    be    coloured    by    a 
material   body — upon    the    characteristics    of   which    it 
would   depend  largely  for   its   manifestation.     The  fact, 
therefore,  that  perfect  health  is  ideal,  and  more  or  less 
diseased  states  of  the  body  universal,  would  indicate,  in 
part  at  least,  why  it  is  that  death  is  universal.     If  the 
vibratory  theory  of  the  activity  of  life  be  true  ;  and  if, 
further,  it   be  true  that  mental  states  can  modify  this 
energy  known  to  us  as  life,  lowering  its  tone  and  rate 
because  of  the  lessened  activity  of  the  mind,  it  might  be 
possible  to  conceive  a  unification  of  the  theories  advanced : 
one  that  would  enable  us  to  see  how  death  is  induced  on 


230  DEATH 

the  one  hand,  and  how  it  may  be  largely  postponed  (as  is 
often  the  case)  by  icill  power  and  other  mental  states  on 
the  other.  It  is  to  be  hoped  that,  in  years  to  come,  this 
question  will  receive  the  attention  it  deserves,  when  some 
definite  results  may  be  forthcoming — founded  upon  ex- 
tended observation  and  experimental  evidence ;  and  then 
it  may  be  that  we  shall  find  our  conclusions  verified — 
or,  on  the  other  hand,  supplanted  by  a  theory  that  may 
be  better  and  more  inclusive  than  either  of  ours,  or  any 
other  so  far  advanced. 


CHAPTER  XII 

GENERAL  CONCLUSIONS 

The  twentieth  century,  says  Professor  Fournier  D'Albe/ 

"is  too  busy  to  occupy  itself  much  with  the  problems  presented 
by  death  and  what  follows  it.  The  man  of  the  world  makes  his 
will,  insures  his  life,  and  dismisses  his  own  death  with  the  scantiest 
forms  of  politeness.  The  churches,  once  chiefly  interested  in  the 
ultimate  fate  of  the  soul  after  death,  now  devote  the  bulk  of  their 
energies  to  moral  instruction  and  social  amelioration.  Death  is  all 
but  dead  as  an  overshadowing  doom  and  an  all-absorbing  subject  of 
controversy. 

"The  spectacle  of  2,000,000,000  human  beings  rushing  to  their 
doom,  with  no  definite  knowledge  of  what  that  doom  may  be,  and 
yet  taking  life  as  it  comes,  happily  and  merrily  enough  as  a  rule, 
seems  strange  and  almost  unaccountable.  The  spectacle  somewhat 
resembles  that  inside  a  prison  during  the  Reign  of  Terror,  when 
prisoners  passed  their  time  in  animated  and  even  gay  converse, 
not  knowing  who  would  be  called  out  next  to  be  trundled  to  the 
scaffold. 

"  Every  year  some  40,000,000  human  corpses  are  consigned  to 
the  earth.  A  million  tons  of  human  flesh  and  blood  and  bone  are 
discarded  as  of  no  further  service  to  humanity,  to  be  gradually 
transformed  into  other  substances  and  perhaps  other  forms  of  life. 
Meanwhile  the  human  race,  in  its  myriad  forms,  lives  and  thrives. 
.  .  .  The  individual  perishes,  the  species  survives.  ..." 

As  Professor  F.  C.  S.  Schiller  ^  (of  Oxford)  also  says  : — 

^  Neio  Light  on  Immortality,  pp.  1-3. 
^  Humanism,  and  other  Essays,  pp.  284-86. 
231 


2  32  DEATH 

"  Death  is  a  topic  on  which  philosopliers  have  been  astonishingly 
common-place.  .  .  .  Spinoza  was  right  in  maintaining  that  there 
is  no  subject  concerning  which  the  sage  thinks  less  than  about 
death,  which,  nevertheless,  is  a  great  pity,  for  the  sage  is  surely 
wrong.  There  is  no  subject  concerning  which  he,  if  he  is  an 
idealist  and  has  the  courage  of  his  opinion,  ought  to  think  more, 
and  oiiglit  to  have  more  interesting  things  to  say. 

"  In  partial  proof  of  which  let  me  attempt  to  arouse  him  to 
reflection  by  pronouncing  some  old  paradoxes  about  death  which 
will,  I  think,  be  germane  to  our  subject : — 

"(1)  No  man  ever  yet  perished  without  annihilating  also  the 
world  in  which  he  lived. 

"  (2)  No  man  ever  yet  saw  another  die ;  but,  if  he  had,  he 
would  have  witnessed  his  own  annihilation.  .  .  . 

"  (3)  To  die  is  to  cut  off  our  connection  with  our  friends ;  but 
do  they  cut  us,  or  we  them,  or  both,  or  neither  1 " 

As  regards  (1),  reference  is  here  made  to  the  world  of 
his  experience,  or,  as  we  might  perhaps  say  with  still 
more  accuracy,  the  objective  world,  in  so  far  as  it  was 
assumed  to  explain  his  experience  :  (2)  is  true  because 
we  can  never  see  another's  self ;  what  we  see  is  the  death 
of  the  hocly,  which  is  merely  a  phenomenon — is  ottr  oivn 
world  of  experience.  Death  is  not  the  same  thing  for 
him  who  experiences  it  and  for  him  who  witnesses  it. 

Indeed  the  subject  of  death  is  as  little  studied  as  it  is 
fascinating  and  all  but  insoluble.  For,  on  its  psychological 
side,  it  presents  the  great  problems  of  immortality  and 
the  persistence  of  consciousness  beyond  the  grave.  And 
on  its  physiological  side  it  presents  also  (as  we  have  seen) 
phenomena  of  the  greatest  interest.  Myers  defined  death 
as  the  "irrevocable  self- projection  of  the  spirit,"^  and 
attempted  to  show  the  link  of  connection  with  certain 
psychic  phenomena  in  this  life.  Doubtless  life  presents  this 
psychological  side,  and  to  this  we  shall  address  ourselves 

^  Human  Personality ,  vol.  ii.,  p.  524. 


GENERAL  CONCLUSIONS  233 

in  Part  III.  It  also  presents  a  purely  physiological  side 
and  offers  problems  for  solution  which  cannot  be  solved 
in  any  such  offhand  manner  as  many  physiologists  would 
lead  us  to  believe.^  Indeed,  the  very  moment  of  death  is 
altogether  uncertain — so  much  so,  in  fact,  that  Schultze 
and  Virchow  (1870)  coined  the  term  "necrobiosis"  to 
designate  the  transition  stage  between  life  and  death. 
Often  there  is  no  definite  time  at  which  life  ceases  and 
death  begins ;  but  there  is  a  gradual  passage  from  normal 
life  to  complete  death,  which  frequently  begins  to  be 
noticeable  during  the  course  of  some  disease.  Death  is 
developed  out  of  life. 

And  if  this  be  true,  might  not  the  reverse  be  true 
also  ?  Might  not  life  be  developed  out  of  death  ?  Truly 
death  is  a  tragedy  to  those  who  are  left;  but  is  it  also  a 
tragedy  to  the  one  who  has  solved  the  great  mystery  ? 
If  "  every  cloud  has  a  silver  lining  "  might  we  not  take 
it  for  granted  that  this  one  has  too ;  and  that,  beyond 
"  the  valley  of  the  shadow,"  there  is  surely  a  hill-top 
upon  which  the  golden  rays  of  the  sun  fall  with  ever- 
quickening  glow  ?  Such  would  assuredly  be  the  outcome 
of  a  cheerful  and  healthy  philosophy '  As  Stevenson 
said  in  his  Acs  Triplex — and  we  cannot  do  better  than 
conclude  in  his  stirring  words : — 


1  Thus:  "Death  .  .  .  is  simply  the  destruction  of  protoplasm,  which 
would,  of  course,  destroy  its  properties  "  {The  Living  World,  by  H.  W. 
Conn,  p.  32).  Apart  from  accident,  however,  we  see  no  reason  for  this 
"destruction,"  so  calmly  supposed.  Why  should  it  take  place ?  Again, 
Loeb  {The  Dynamics  of  Living  Matter,  p.  223)  says  :  "  In  man  and  the 
higher  mammalians  death  seems  to  be  caused  directly  or  indirectly 
through  micro-organisms  or  other  injuries  to  vital  organs."  Surely  this 
can  hardly  be  considered  a  definition  of  natural  death,  which,  according 
to  his  own  earlier  statements,  does  take  place.  And,  in  opposition  to  this 
view.  Professor  Wesley  Mills  {Animal  Physiology,  p.  669)  says  :  "  Few 
animals  perish  from  simple  decay  leading  to  a  gradual  slowing  of  the 
vital  machinery  down  to  zero,  so  to  speak  ;  but  when  death  is  not  due  to 
violence,  as  it  frequently  is,  it  arises  from  some  essential  part  getting  out 
of  gear,  either  directly  or  indirectly." 


234  DEATH 

"  All  literature,  from  Job  and  Omar  KhayyAm  to  Thomas  Carlyle 
or  Walt  Whitman,  is  but  an  attempt  to  look  upon  the  human  state 
with  such  largeness  of  view  as  shall  enable  us  to  rise  from  the 
definition  of  the  living  to  the  Definition  of  Life.  And  our  sages 
give  us  about  the  best  satisfaction  in  their  power  when  they  say 
that  it  is  a  vapour,  or  a  show,  or  made  out  of  the  same  stuff  with 
dreams.  Philosophy,  in  its  more  rigid  sense,  has  been  at  the  same 
work  for  ages ;  and  after  a  myriad  bald  heads  have  wagged  over 
the  problem,  and  after  a  pile  of  words  have  been  heaped  one  upon 
another  into  dry  and  cloudy  volumes  without  end,  philosophy  has 
the  honour  of  laying  before  us,  with  modest  pride,  her  contribution 
toward  the  subject,  that  life  is  a  Permanent  Possibility  of  Sensa- 
tion. Truly  a  fine  result !  A  man  may  very  well  love  beef,  or 
hunting,  or  a  woman ;  but  surely,  surely,  not  a  Permanent  Possi- 
bility of  Sensation  I  .   .  . 

"  Even  if  death  catch  people  like  an  open  pitfall  and  in  mid- 
career,  laying  out  vast  projects  and  planning  monstrous  foundations 
flushed  with  hope,  and  their  mouths  full  of  boastful  language ; 
should  they  be  at  once  tripped  and  silenced,  is  there  not  something 
brave  and  spirited  in  such  a  termination  ?  and  does  not  life  go  down 
with  a  better  grace,  foaming  in  full-body  over  a  precipice,  than 
miserably  straggling  to  an  end  in  sandy  deltas  ?  When  the  Greeks 
made  their  fine  saying  that  those  whom  the  gods  love  die  young,  I 
cannot  help  believing  that  they  had  this  sort  of  death  also  in  their 
eye.  For  surely,  at  whatever  age  it  overtakes  a  man,  this  is  to  die 
young.  Death  has  not  been  suffered  to  take  so  much  as  an  illusion 
from  his  heart.  In  the  hot-fit  of  life,  a-tiptoe  on  the  highest  point 
of  being,  he  passes  at  a  bound  onto  the  other  side.  The  noise  of 
the  mallet  and  chisel  are  scarcely  quenched,  the  trumpets  are 
hardly  done  blowing,  when,  trailing  with  him  clouds  of  glory,  this 
happy-starred,  full-blooded  spirit  shoots  into  the  spiritual  world." 


PART   II 

HISTORICAL 


CHAPTEH   I 

MAN'S  THEORIES  ABOUT   IMMORTALITY 

The  problem  of  the  perpetuity  of  existence  is  one  that 
has  been  a  strong  dynamic  force  in  stimulating  and 
shaping  the  thought  of  man  from  the  moment  that  he 
arose  sufficiently  from  the  plane  of  barbarism  to  be 
able  to  commence  to  exercise  his  mental  qualities  in  this 
direction.  In  the  earlier  days  of  his  existence  he  may 
have  been  satisfied  with  the  life  that  the  objective  senses 
knew ;  but  when  the  character  of  the  great  mystery  of 
the  origin  and  destiny  of  life  began  to  dawn  upon  him, 
the  element  of  dissatisfaction  invariably  took  possession 
of  his  thoughts.  Instinctively  he  felt  that,  as  he  must 
have  come  from  something,  it  was  quite  reasonable  to 
suppose  that  he  was  the  object  of  the  solicitude  of  the 
Invisible  Power  that  had  created  him,  and  that  it  was 
the  purpose  of  that  Power  to  convey  him  through  the 
experiences  of  this  world  to  some  higher  plane,  where 
life  would  flow  on  more  smoothly,  or  even  in  an  unbroken 
round  of  bliss. 

It  is  to  such  longings  for  the  preservation  of  the  "  Ego  " 
that  we  owe  the  origin  of  our  religious  faiths  and  systems, 
for,  as  Max  Miiller  says,  "  without  such  a  belief  religion  is 
like  an  arch  resting  on  one  pillar."  ^  In  the  course  of 
his  intellectual  development  there  comes  a  time  when 
man,  to  some  extent,  rises  above  the  necessity  of  a  belief 

^  Chips  from  a  Gennan  Workshop,  i.  45. 
237 


238  DEATH 

in  immortality ;  but  there  can  be  no  doubt  but  that  such 
a  theory  of  negation  is  a  mental  conception  that  cannot 
be  attained  except  through  the  process  of  reason.  That 
is  to  say,  while  it  is  possible  for  man  to  argue  himself 
into  a  belief  in  almost  anything,  he  is  quite  as  capable  of 
persuading  himself  that  he  believes  in  nothing — either 
nothing  here  or  nothing  in  the  hereafter;  whereas  the 
question,  if  it  is  left  to  the  instinct  or  to  the  desires  of 
the  human  soul,  inevitably  resolves  itself  into  a  cry  for  pro- 
tection from  the  annihilation  of  the  grave.  As  M.  Soldi, 
the  eminent  archaeologist,  has  shown,  the  rudimentary 
drawings  on  the  practically  shapeless  monuments  that 
represent  our  earliest  record  of  man's  physical  existence 
clearly  interpret  a  belief  in  a  survival  of  conscious  exist- 
ence ;  and  even  the  savage  tribes,  far  though  they  may 
be  from  the  pale  of  civilisation,  refuse  to  admit  that 
the  human  personality  that  distinguishes  one  man  from 
another  is  destroyed  by  death.  Though  the  body  must 
perish,  that  something  within  the  body  that  stands  for 
individual  identity  still  lives  on  in  the  faiths  and  tradi- 
tions of  almost  every  land  and  from  the  furthest  days  of 
antiquity.  Naturally,  some  of  these  notions  are  exceed- 
ingly crude,  and  some,  perhaps,  are  extremely  materialistic. 
Behind  even  the  darkest  and  most  obscure  ideas,  however, 
the  star  of  hope  is  shining.  Behind  the  most  primitive 
superstitions  there  is  always  the  theory  that  death  is  not 
the  end  of  conscious  being. 

So  far  as  we  have  been  enabled  to  ascertain,  ancestor 
worship  was  one  of  the  first  systematic  religious  ideas 
that  the  human  mind  was  able  to  formulate.  Prior  to 
the  acceptance  of  this  system,  religion,  where  it  existed 
at  all,  was  extremely  gross  in  its  sentiments.  In  the 
beginning  it  had  undoubtedly  consisted  in  the  worship  of 
fetiches,  and  the  semi-superstitious  notions  that  followed 
these  cruder  manifestations  of  man's  innate  dependence 


MAN'S  THEORIES  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY     239 

upon  a  superior  power  mark  the  first  appearance  of  the 
theory  of  survival  among  primitive  people. 

Among  savage  tribes  the  idea  prevailed  that  the  soul, 
while  in  one  sense  independent  of  the  human  body,  could 
not  entirely  depart  from  it ;  and  it  was  due  to  this  notion 
that  both  the  custom  of  preserving  the  body  of  the  dead 
and  the  practice  of  eating  it  originated.  If  the  corpse 
was  preserved  the  soul  would  not  be  required  to  abandon 
it  entirely,  and  could  re-enter  its  envelope  on  the  day  of 
resurrection;  while  the  theory  of  eating  the  dead  was 
based  upon  the  belief  that  this  assimilation  of  the  flesh 
by  the  relatives  of  the  departed  was  the  best  sepulchre 
that  could  be  provided. 

Repellent  as  these  notions  may  seem,  it  must  be 
admitted  that  belief  in  the  survival  also  led  to  other 
criminal  customs  that  are  even  more  horrible  to  contem- 
plate, for  the  terrible  practice  of  cannibalism,  as  well  as 
the  slaughter  of  the  aged  and  infirm,  was  a  ceremonial 
crime  that  had  its  origin  in  this  wrong  conception  of 
the  future  life. 

It  is  a  long  step  from  the  savage  beliefs  in  cannibalism 
and  the  lowest  form  of  metempsychosis  to  the  more 
civilised  worship  of  ancestors  to  which  the  Chinese  race 
still  adheres ;  for,  while  one  represented  the  grossest 
sentiment  of  barbarism,  the  latter  introduced  the  family 
institution,  a  social  system  that  was  destined  to  become 
one  of  the  leading  civilisations  of  antiquity. 

While  it  is  true  that  Confucius  did  not  explicitly  teach 
the  doctrine  of  the  immortality  of  the  soul,  his  avoidance 
of  this  subject  does  not  imply  a  lack  of  belief  in  survival, 
for  there  is  no  record  of  any  time  when  the  Chinese  have 
not  believed  that,  at  the  moment  of  death,  each  person 
"  returned  to  his  family."  Even  Confucius  taught  that 
the  spirits  of  the  good  were  permitted  to  revisit  their 
former   habitations   on   earth,  or   such   other   places   as 


240  DEATH 

might  be  prepared  by  their  descendants  who  desired  to 
pay  them  homage  and  receive  their  benedictions.  From 
this  idea  came  the  duty  of  performing  sacred  rites  in 
such  places,  the  penalty  of  any  neglect  of  this  service 
being  the  loss,  to  those  living,  of  the  supreme  felicity 
flowing  from  the  homage  of  their  own  descendants  when 
they,  too,  had  departed.  While  the  survival  of  the 
Chinese  is  in  one  respect  an  impersonal  immortality,  it 
being  a  blending  of  the  individual  spirit  in  a  kind  of 
collective  family-soul,  the  union  of  this  soul  with  its 
descendants  is  so  close  that  it  may  almost  be  said  to  owe 
its  very  existence  to  the  continuance  of  the  homage  paid 
to  it. 

Among  the  Egyptians  we  find  the  idea  of  immortality 
assuming  a  more  definite  shape,  for  they  clearly  recognised 
both  a  dwelling-place  of  the  dead  and  an  actual  judg- 
ment, with  its  separation  of  the  just  and  the  unjust.  Osiris 
was  to  sit  as  judge,  and,  all  hearts  having  been  weighed 
in  his  scales  of  justice,  the  wicked  were  sent  to  the  regions 
of  darkness,  while  the  elect  were  admitted  to  a  participa- 
tion in  the  blissful  existence  enjoyed  by  the  god  of  light. 
Bound  up  with  this  very  clear  idea  of  immortality  were 
many  esoteric  doctrines  regarding  the  nature  of  the  soul, 
as  well  as  beliefs  that  made  the  preservation  of  the  body 
so  necessary  to  the  proper  continuance  of  the  soul  life, 
that  vast  tombs  were  built  and  the  remains  of  the  dead 
were  embalmed,  undoubtedly  with  the  intention  of  making 
them  last  forever. 

If  it  is  not  easy  to  find  an  affirmation  of  the  doctrine 
of  the  survival  in  the  books  of  the  Old  Testament,  it 
appears  in  the  esoteric  books  of  the  Hebrews,  and  in  no 
uncertain  tone.  In  fact,  there  can  be  no  question  as  to 
the  Jewish  acceptance  of  this  idea,  for  while  Moses 
concealed  the  knowledge  that  he  must  have  derived 
from  the  Egyptians,  there  is  good  reason  to  believe  that 


MAN'S  THEORIES  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY     241 

it  was  preached  to  the  initiates.  In  speaking  of  this 
reserve  upon  the  part  of  the  illustrious  legislator,  Bishop 
Warburton  held  that  this  very  silence  was  an  indication 
of  his  divine  mission.  "  Moses,"  he  said,  "  being  sustained 
in  his  legislation  and  government  by  immediate  divine 
authority,  had  not  the  same  necessity  that  other  teachers 
have  for  a  recourse  to  threatenings  and  punishments 
drawn  from  the  future  world,  in  order  to  enforce 
obedience." 

Professor  Ernst  Stahelin,  in  The  Foundations  of  Our 
Faith,  argues  along  similar  lines : — 

"  Moses  and,  Confucius  did  not  expressly  teach  the  immortality 
of  the  soul ;  nay,  they  seemed  purposely  to  avoid  entering  upon 
the  subject ;  they  simply  took  it  for  granted.  Thus  Moses  spoke  of 
the  tree  of  life  in  Paradise,  of  which  if  the  man  took  he  should  live 
forever,  and  called  God  the  God  of  Abraham,  Isaac,  and  Jacob, 
thus  implying  their  continued  existence,  since  God  could  not  be  a 
God  of  the  dead,  but  only  of  the  living ;  and  Confucius,  while  in 
some  respects  avoiding  all  mention  of  future  things,  nevertheless 
enjoined  honours  to  be  paid  to  departed  spirits  (thus  assuming 
their  life  after  death)  as  one  of  the  chief  duties  of  a  religious 
man." 

Another  evidence  that  the  Jews  believed  in  immor- 
tality may  be  drawn  from  the  laws  which  Moses  pro- 
mulgated against  necromancy,  or  the  invocation  of  the 
dead.  This  magic  art  was  very  generally  practised  by 
the  Canaanites,  and,  notwithstanding  these  laws,  prevailed 
among  the  Jews  at  the  time  of  King  Saul  (1  Sam.  xxviii.), 
or  even  later  (Ps.  cvi.  28,  &c.). 

Job,  the  Maccabees,  and  several  other  biblical  books, 
present  a  striking  exception  to  this  rule  of  silence  regard- 
ing the  future  life  which  so  generally  prevails  throughout 
the  Old  Testament.  To  illustrate,  in  J«l»  (xix.  25-27) 
we  may  read : — 


242  DEATH 

"  For  I  know  that  my  Redeemer  livetli,  and  in  the  last  day  I  shall 
rise  out  of  the  earth,  and  I  shall  be  clothed  again  with  my  skin, 
and  in  my  flesh  shall  I  see  God  :  whom  I  myself  shall  see  and  my 
eyes  shall  behold,  and  not  another ;  this  my  hope  is  laid  up  in  my 
bosom." 

This,  as  well  as  many  other  passages  that  might  be 
quoted,  if  necessary,  show  very  clearly  that  the  ancient 
Hebrews  not  only  believed  in  the  survival  of  the  soul,  but 
in  a  literal  bodily  resurrection  as  w^ell,  while  the  Cabala  and 
the  Zoliar,  the  two  books  that  summarise  the  doctrines 
taught  to  the  initiates,  make  it  impossible  to  doubt  that 
the  idea  of  immortality  was  early  adopted  by  the  Jewish 
people. 

All  the  Hindu  sects  have  a  distinct  leaning  towards 
the  mystic  or  metaphysical  view  of  life.  There  are  so 
many  different  expressions  of  opinion  among  Hindu 
philosophers,  however,  that  it  is  impossible  to  select  any 
single  theory  as  one  that  can  be  presented  as  a  standard 
of  comparison  with  other  religions.  In  every  instance, 
however,  some  sort  of  survival  is  recognised,  and,  in  most 
cases,  both  the  theory  of  the  transmigration  of  souls  and 
the  doctrine  of  the  desirability  of  a  life  of  purely 
meditative  asceticism  are  presented. 

"To  the  modern  Hindu  mind,  the  soul  is  a  complex  creation, 
made  up  of  a  number  of  fluid-like,  invisible  elements  centred  about 
an  immaterial  principle.  Each  of  these  elements  corresponds  to  a 
particular  faculty  of  the  soul,  and  may,  therefore,  be  considered 
as  relatively  independent  of  the  others.  The  element  is  more 
subtile  and  attenuated  in  proportion  as  the  corresponding  faculty  is 
higher  and  more  characteristic  of  man.  At  death  the  astral  body, 
accompanied  by  the  superior  elements,  detaches  itself  from  the 
physical  body,  which  is  now  deprived  of  vitality  ;  it  thus  preserves 
a  complete  individuality,  which,  according  as  it  is  good  or  bad, 
determines  which  place  it  shall  henceforth  inhabit  as  the  con- 
sequence of  its  terrestrial  existence  "  (Elbe,  vi.  73,  74). 


MAN'S  THEORIES  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY     243 

The  more  abstract  conceptions  of  Nirvana  and  Moksha 
have  been  largely  superseded  by  these  and  other  more 
modern  theories. 

Although  our  knowledge  regarding  the  teachings  of 
the  Magi  of  Chaldea  is  very  incomplete,  the  portions 
that  have  been  recovered  are  quite  sufficient  to  establish 
the  fact  that  the  Chaldeans  not  only  accepted  the  idea 
of  survival,  but  that  their  interpretation  of  this  theory 
was  more  rational  than  the  notions  displayed  by  most 
other  ancient  nations.  The  Egyptians,  for  example,  were 
utterly  unable  to  escape  from  the  idolatrous  notions  that 
obtrude  themselves  into  almost  every  phase  of  their 
religious  system,  whereas  the  Chaldeans  lost  all  idea 
of  idolatry  in  their  construction  of  a  religion  of  pure 
ideals  and  lofty  conceptions.  The  ancient  Chaldeans 
believed  in  the  survival  of  the  soul,  even  accepting 
the  idea  of  a  bodily  resurrection.  As  Pausanias  says 
(Book  IV.  c.  xxii.),  the  Magi  always  taught  that  those 
who  had  lived  pure  and  just  lives  would  go  to  the  bright 
realm  of  Ormuzd,  while  the  wicked  would  pass  into  the 
region  of  darkness.  This  doctrine,  which  was  taught  by 
Zoroaster,  is  still  held  by  the  modern  Parsees.  Their 
position  respecting  the  soul  and  its  destiny  was  thus 
explained  by  Edward  Barucha,  a  Parsee  priest  in  Bombay, 
in  a  communication  to  the  Religious  Congress  : — 

"  The  undying  spiritual  element  was  created  before  the  body, 
and  both  were  united  at  birth  and  are  parted  at  death.  The  soul, 
which  comes  from  the  spirit  world,  is  possessed  of  various  senses 
and  faculties ;  it  enters  the  new-born  body,  out  of  which  it  will 
return  at  death  into  the  spiritual  world.  Zoroaster  teaches  us 
that  God  grants  to  the  soul  such  means  and  assistance  as  are 
requisite  for  the  carrying  out  of  its  allotted  task :  these  are 
knowledge,  wisdom,  judgment,  thought,  action,  free-will,  religious 
conscience,  a  guardian  angel  or  beneficent  genius,  and,  above  all, 
revelation.     At  the  resurrection  of  the  dead,  when  all  things  shall 


244  •  DEATH 

be  renewed  and  the  whole  of  creation  will  begin  over  again,  the 
souls  will  be  provided  with  new  bodies,  that  they  may  taste,  in  the 
life  to  come,  bliss  ineffable." 

Amonof  the  ancient  nations  that  believed  in  the  soul's 
survival,  none  had  a  firmer  or  more  active  faith  in  im- 
mortality than  the  Gauls ;  for  it  was  this  doctrine  of  a 
future  life,  with  its  rewards  and  punishments,  that  laid  the 
foundation  for  their  institutions  as  well  as  their  individual 
life.  The  acts  of  heroism  with  which  they  accentuated 
their  devotion  to  the  State  and  their  contempt  for  deatk, 
were  the  direct  effect  of  their  belief  in  a  future  worli. 
Unfortunately,  as  in  the  case  of  the  Druidic  and  some 
other  doctrines,  a  complete  idea  of  the  teachings  of  the 
Gauls'  philosophy  is  unobtainable.  Thus  we  know  that 
they  held  that  man's  immaterial  part  was  a  divine 
emanation,  and  that  this  was  the  one  vital  principle  of 
life.  Prior  to  its  appearance  as  the  soul  of  man,  however, 
it  had  animated  many  forms  of  inferior  life — first  plants, 
and  afterwards  animals.  After  this  experience  it  was 
imprisoned  in  the 

"circle  of  the  abyss,  anufu,  but,  after  long  years  of  struggle 
and  waiting,  it  escaped  thence,  and  entered  the  circle  of  liberty, 
ahred,  which  is  also  the  circle  of  transmigration.  This  circle  includes 
all  the  worlds  of  trial  and  atonement  peopled  by  mankind ;  and  of 
these  worlds  the  earth  is  one.  After  many  transmigrations  the 
soul  will  pass  on,  and  will  attain  the  circle  of  happy  worlds  and 
felicity,  gwynjid.  But  even  this  is  not  all.  Far  higher  and 
inaccessibly  removed  is  the  circle  of  the  infinite,  ceugant,  encom- 
passing the  other  circles  and  belonging  to  God  alone "  (Elbe, 
c.  viii.  89,  90). 

While  the  Gauls  taught  the  passage  of  the  soul 
through  many  forms,  their  doctrine  of  transmigration 
was  infinitely  nobler  than  the  more  or  less  crude  ideas 
that  appear  in  the  early  theories  of  metempsychosis.     It 


MAN'S  THEORIES  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY     245 

was  a  passing  through  many  bodies,  inckiding  those  of 
animals,  or  even  plants,  but  its  progress  was  marked  by 
a  steady  ascent  towards  the  heights  of  infinite  perfection, 
and  there  was  no  place  in  this  plan  for  the  return  of  the 
soul  to  lower  conditions.  So  thoroughly  were  the  Gauls 
convinced  of  the  truth  of  their  doctrines,  and  so  firm  was 
their  faith  in  the  glory  of  the  future  life,  that  they  always 
gave  a  condemned  prisoner  five  years  in  which  to  prepare 
for  death,  not  only  that  he  might  have  time  for  repent- 
ance for  his  own  sake,  but  for  the  reason  that  they  did 
not  desire  to  sully  the  spirit  world  by  sending  a  guilty 
soul  into  it. 

In  the  Druidical  doctrine,  the  earth  was  an  inferior 
world  devised  as  a  transient  abode  for  the  soul  during 
its  work  of  preparation  for  admission  to  the  world  of 
love.  This  goal,  which  is  attained  only  after  many 
transmigrations,  is  the  reward  bestowed  upon  those  who 
have  conquered  the  three  great  shortcomings  of  life  : 
(1)  neglect  of  self-instruction,  (2)  lack  of  love  of  good, 
and  (3)  attachment  to  evil. 

When  the  ancient  Greeks  maintained  the  idea  of 
survival,  as  may  be  seen  by  an  examination  of  their 
legendary  tales  or  mythology,  it  seldom  appeared  to 
form  a  reason  for  their  acts.  It  was  at  the  foundation 
of  their  mysteries,  and  the  arguments  that  their  philo- 
sophers advanced  for  a  l^elief  in  a  future  existence  are 
often  adapted  to  modern  use.  So  far  as  the  character  of 
this  doctrine  of  immortality  was  concerned,  however,  it 
was  not  to  be  compared  to  the  clearly  defined  notions 
maintained  by  the  Gauls.  According  to  the  Greek 
idea,  the  soul  of  the  deceased  person  enjoyed  at  least  a 
semi-conscious  existence,  in  which  it  retained  a  sort  of 
half-sensible  dependence  upon  the  physical  comforts 
of  life.  Accordingly  the  smell  of  blood  of  animals,  or 
their  cooking  flesh,  was  supposed  to  be  most  agreeable  to 


246  DEATH 

the  shades  of  the  dead  heroes.  It  was  due  to  this  belief 
that  funeral  banquets  were  held,  to  Avhich — when  the 
holy  fire  had  been  kindled  upon  the  altar  of  Zeus  by 
the  head  of  the  family — the  souls  of  the  ancestors  were 
summoned  that  they  might  derive  their  pleasure  from 
the  food  that  was  to  be  sacrificed  for  the  satisfaction 
of  their  ghostly  appetite. 

Crude  as  these  ideas  of  the  people  may  seem,  the  poets 
and  philosophers  upheld  more  spiritual  theories,  by  which 
they  not  only  taught  the  future  existence  of  the  soul, 
but  the  two  alternatives  of  good  and  evil  awaiting  it 
after  death.     Thus  Hesiod  wrote  : — 

"  Wrapped  in  the  fluid-like  envelopes  rendering  them  invisible, 
the  souls  of  the  righteous  wander  over  the  earth  wielding  their 
regal  powers.  They  mark  the  good  and  evil  deeds,  and  they 
extend  their  special  protection  to  such  as  they  have  loved  in  life. 
As  to  the  souls  of  the  wicked,  they  are  held  in  Tartarus,  where 
they  are  punished  by  the  ever-present  memory  of  the  crimes  which 
they  have  committed." 

Some  six  centuries  later  these  views  were  more 
definitely  and,  in  many  respects,  more  rationally  for- 
mulated by  Pythagoras,  one  of  the  greatest  of  the  world's 
philosophers.  He  asserted  that,  in  addition  to  the  natural 
body,  a  spiritual  element  existed — an  element  possessing 
unity  and  surrounded  by  a  semi-material  soul.  In 
appearance  this  soul  resembled  the  body,  to  which  it 
was  so  necessary  that  life  would  become  extinct  the 
moment  it  was  withdrawn.  Thus  death  was  the  with- 
drawal of  the  soul  from  the  body,  and  in  the  act  of 
withdrawing  it  took  with  it  the  spirit,  or  the  immaterial 
element  which  it  enfolded,  and  proceeded  to  a  region  in 
space  corresponding  in  character  to  the  nature  of  the 
deeds  that  it  had  performed  in  the  flesh.  As  Plato 
described  it,  the  pure  soul  soared  upward  with  the  spirit 
to  the  spheres  divine,  while  the  impure  soul  fell  back 


MAN'S  THEORIES  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY     247 

"  into  the  dark  regions  of  matter."  To  explain  the 
inequality  of  human  conditions  and  the  apparent  injus- 
tices of  life,  Pythagoras  took  refuge  in  the  doctrine  of 
reincarnation. 

The  Romans  were  not  dissimilar  from  the  Chinese  in 
their  early  adoption  of  the  system  of  ancestor  worship, 
and  it  was  upon  this  religious  idea  that  they  constructed 
the  family  organisation  that  contributed  to  the  successful 
upbuilding  of  their  social  state.  Their  ideas  of  immor- 
tality, however,  while  more  impersonal  in  their  tendency 
than  those  of  the  Greeks,  were  still  sufficiently  apparent 
to  be  recognisable.  They  did  not  theorise  as  to  the 
effect  of  this  future  life  upon  the  general  harmony  of 
the  universe,  or  apply  its  rewards  to  the  acts  of  this 
existence,  for,  as  Elbe  has  said,  "  the  thought  of  immor- 
tality appears  rather  as  a  pious  longing  of  the  imagination 
devoid  of  sufficient  support  in  the  reality  of  fact." 

Despite  this,  however,  the  idea  of  immortality  appears 
quite  conspicuously  in  the  works  of  many  Roman  writers. 
Thus  Ovid  not  only  explicitly  announces  his  belief  in  a 
future  existence,  but  even  adopts  the  theory  of  trans- 
migration as  a  logical  explanation  of  the  phenomena  of 
natural  life.  "  Nothing  perishes,"  he  says,  ''  but  every- 
thing changes  here  on  earth.  Souls  come  and  go 
unceasingly  in  visible  form;  the  animals  that  succeed 
in  acquiring  goodness  take  upon  them  human  form." 
Cicero,  too,  expresses  his  belief  in  immortality,  and  adds 
that  it  has  been  the  universal  theory  from  the  day  of 
man's  first  appearance  upon  earth.  To  quote  the  passage 
from  Scipio's  Dream  : — 

"  Know  that  it  is  not  thou,  but  thy  body  alone  which  is  mortal. 
The  individual  in  his  entirety  resides  in  the  soul,  and  not  in  the 
outward  form.  Learn,  then,  that  thou  art  a  god  ;  thou,  the  im- 
mortal intelligence  which  gives  movement  to  a  perishable  body, 
just  as  the  eternal  God  animates  an  incorruptible  body." 


248  DEATH 

As  the  speculations  of  Christian  theology  are  described 
in  the  chapter  on  "  The  Theological  Aspect  of  Death  and 
Immortality,"  it  is  only  necessary  to  refer  at  this  time  to 
two  ideas  that  are  iu  direct  opposition  to  these  modern 
religious  opinions.  These  are  the  ideas  of  Spiritualism 
and  Theosophy,  which  embody  many  of  the  more  or  less 
esoteric  doctrines  of  antiquity,  but  reproduced  in  modern 

Of  course,  the  use  of  the  word  "  Spiritualism  "  in  this 
connection  is  due  entirely  to  the  fact  that  the  term  has 
derived  the  authority  of  popular  approval.  Literally,  the 
title  "  Spiritualism "  should  be  used  solely  to  describe 
theories  that  are  contrary  to  those  of  "  Materialism,"  and 
in  this  respect  every  professing  Christian  is  spiritualistic 
in  his  beliefs.  Ordinarily,  therefore,  the  term  "  Spiritism" 
is  much  to  be  preferred  ;  but  in  this  instance  we  will 
follow  the  line  of  least  resistance,  and  speak  of  the 
"  Spiritists  "  in  the  manner  that  will  be  generally  under- 
stood. 

It  is  the  teaching  of  this  theory  that  the  discarnate 
soul,  on  entering  the  future  world,  carries  with  it  the 
'perisprit,  or  astral  body,  which  it  had  possessed  during 
the  period  of  earthly  existence.  So  far  as  rewards  and 
punishments  are  concerned,  the  soul  finds  its  future 
already  written  into  the  record  of  its  earthly  acts.  If  its 
mind  has  been  centred  upon  elevating  thoughts,  if  it 
has  not  been  too  deeply  absorbed  in  material  things,  and 
if  it  has  lived  in  accordance  with  the  purest  law  of  love, 
it  finds  it  possible  to  go  far  from  the  earth  plane,  into 
the  condition  in  which  good  and  righteous  souls  abide. 
If,  on  the  other  hand,  it  passes  into  the  next  life  under 
evil  conditions,  it  is  practically  chained  to  earth.  Its 
perisprit  is  far  more  material,  and  its  ability  to  retain 
the  memory  of  the  pleasures  and  needs  of  the  physical 
life  inspires  so  strong  a  craving  for  these  material  things, 


MAN'S  THEORIES  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY     249 

that  it  remains  close  to  earth,  where  it  may  seize  upon 
every  opportunity  to  appear  to  the  hving.  When  spirits 
appear  under  noxious  conditions  they  become  what  may 
be  termed  "  evil  spirits,"  or  what  are  popularly  known  as 
"  demons."  It  is  upon  this  theory  that  the  idea  of 
demoniac  possession  is  based. 

Under  more  favourable  conditions,  however,  the  spirit 
succeeds  in  animating  the  partially  free  perisprit  of  a 
living  person,  after  which  it  is  able  to  produce  the 
phenomena  that  have  played  so  important  a  part  in  the 
development  of  modern  spiritualism,  sometimes  giving 
communications  that  are  intended  to  establish  the  fact 
of  the  existence  of  the  personality  after  death.  Dr. 
Alfred  Russel  Wallace,  in  his  Miracles  and  Modern 
Spirihcalism,  pp.  115-16,  thus  sums  up  the  belief  of 
the  average  spiritualist  on  this  question : — 

"  After  death  man's  spirit  survives  in  an  ethereal  body,  gifted 
with  new  powers,  but  mentally  and  morally  the  same  individual 
as  when  clothed  in  flesh.  Then  he  commences  from  that  moment 
a  course  of  apparently  endless  progression,  which  is  rapid  just  in 
proportion  as  his  mental  and  moral  faculties  have  been  exercised 
and  cultivated  while  on  earth.  Thus  his  comparative  happiness 
or  misery  will  depend  entirely  on  himself.  Just  in  proportion  as 
his  higher  human  faculties  have  taken  part  in  all  his  pleasures, 
here  will  he  find  himself  contented  and  happy  in  a  state  of  exist- 
ence in  which  they  will  have  the  fullest  exercise ;  while  he  who 
has  depended  more  on  the  body  than  on  the  mind  for  his  pleasures 
will,  when  the  body  is  no  more,  feel  a  grievous  want,  and  must 
slowly  and  painfully  develop  his  intellectual  and  moral  nature 
until  its  exercise  shall  become  easy  and  pleasurable.  Neither 
punishments  nor  rewards  are  meted  out  by  an  External  power, 
but  each  one's  condition  is  the  natural  and  inevitable  sequence  of 
his  condition  here.  He  starts  again  from  the  level  of  moral  and 
intellectual  development  to  which  he  had  raised  himself  while  on 
earth." 


250  DEATH 

Emma   Hardinge   Brittain,   in   her  address  on  Hades, 
thus  further  explains  the  position  of  the  spiritualist : — 

"  Of  the  nature  of  these  spheres  and  their  inhabitants,  we  have 
spoken  from  the  knowledge  of  the  spirits, — dwellers  still  in 
Hades.  Would  you  receive  some  immediate  definition  of  your 
own  condition,  and  learn  how  you  shall  dwell,  and  what  your 
garments  shall  be,  what  your  mansion,  scenery,  likeness,  occu- 
pation ■?  Turn  your  eyes  within,  and  ask  what  you  have  learned, 
and  what  you  have  done  in  this,  the  school-house  for  the  spheres 
of  spirit-land.  There — there  is  an  aristocracy,  and  even  royal  rank 
in  varying  degree,  but  the  aristocracy  is  one  of  merit,  and  the 
royalty  of  soul.  It  is  only  the  truly  wise  who  govern,  and,  as  the 
wiser  soul  is  he  that  is  best,  as  the  truest  wisdom  is  the  highest 
love,  so  the  royalty  of  soul  is  truth  and  love.  And  within  the 
spirit-world  all  knowledge  of  this  earth,  all  forms  of  science,  all 
revelations  of  art,  all  mysteries  of  space,  must  be  understood.  The 
exalted  soul  that  is  then  all  ready  for  his  departure  to  a  higher 
state  than  Hades,  must  know  all  that  earth  can  teach,  and  have 
practised  all  that  heaven  requires.  The  spirit  never  quits  the 
spheres  of  earth  until  he  is  fully  possessed  of  all  the  life  and 
knowledge  of  this  planet  and  its  spheres.  And  though  the  pro- 
gress may  be  here  commenced,  and  not  one  jot  of  what  you  learn 
or  think  or  strive  for  here  is  lost,  yet  all  achievements  must  be 
ultimated  there,  and  no  soul  can  wing  its  flight  to  that  which  you 
call,  in  view  of  its  earth  perfection.  Heaven,  till  you  have  passed 
through  Earth  and  Hades,  and  stand  ready  in  your  fully  com- 
pleted pilgrimage,  to  enter  on  the  new  and  unspeakable  glories 
of  the  celestial  realms  beyond." 

Theosophy,  on  the  other  hand,  is  a  more  mystical 
philosophy,  as  it  seeks  to  solve  the  problems  of  life, 
death,  and  the  future  existence  by  means  of  a  system 
of  higher  metaphysics.  In  many  cases  it  has  adopted 
the  ideas  of  the  most  ancient  religions,  especially  the 
esoteric  doctrines  of  the  Hindu  philosophers,  all  of  which 
combine   to   produce  a   system   of  belief  that,   however 


MAN'S  THEORIES  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY     251 

logically  it  may  be  presented,  is  beyond  the  possibility 
of  objective  proof. 

Theosophy  declares  that  the  material  world  is  but  an 
insignificant  portion  of  the  created  universe,  and  that 
the  human  being,  so  far  from  being  confined  to  a  physi- 
cal body,  possesses  a  spiritual  body,  or  invisible,  fluid- 
like, intermediary  body  through  which  the  conscious 
Ego  acts.  Moreover,  this  inner  body  is  extremely  com- 
plex in  its  construction,  being  composed  of  several 
distinct  and  different  bodies,  one  encased  within  another. 
As  summarised  by  Elbe,  these  bodies  are  distinguished 
as  follows : — 

First,  in  order  of  materiality,  there  is  the  etheric  hocly, 
which  assumes  the  form  and  existence  of  the  physical 
body,  to  which  it  is  bound  by  an  indissoluble  bond. 
It  is  composed  of  ether-like  particles  that  are  so  in- 
finitely minute  that  it  is  impossible  to  compare  them 
to  any  earthly  substance.  Born  at  the  inception  of 
organic  life,  and  expiring  at  its  death,  it  governs  its 
manifold  operations. 

Second,  is  the  kamic  or  astral  hody,  the  organ  of  man's 
passions  and  desires.  It  is  the  vehicle  of  feeling  and 
emotion,  and  through  its  operations  the  human  being 
becomes  conscious  of  pleasure,  pain,  passion,  desire,  and 
regret.  Although  composed  of  elements  that  are  more 
subtile  than  those  of  the  etheric  body,  the  materiality 
of  this  body  differs  in  individuals,  just  as  sensitiveness 
does. 

Third,  comes  the  mental  hody,  which  is  the  organ 
of  the  intellect,  and  so,  of  course,  manifests  itself  vari- 
ously in  different  individuals. 

Fourth,  is  the  causal  body,  through  which  man  con- 
ceives abstract  ideas,  receives  the  unconscious  residue 
of  past  experiences,  and  from  which  springs  the  germ 
that  is  to  expand  into  future  existences. 


252  DEATH 

Lastly,  the  Biiddhidic  hodyy  which  is  beUeved  to  be 
in  a  very  embryonic  state,  even  in  persons  of  a  high 
degree  of  righteousness.  It  is  the  organ  of  unselfish 
love,  charity,  and  self-sacrifice. 

While  the  etheric  body,  like  the  physical  body,  does 
not  survive  death,  the  soul  continues  to  exist  in  the 
astral  body  for  a  brief  or  lengthy  period,  according  to  its 
earthly  acts.  This  astral  body  is  finally  destined  to  die, 
whereupon  the  soul  joyously  departs  from  the  plane  of 
conscious  suffering  in  which  till  then  it  has  found  its 
existence,  to  ascend,  now  clothed  in  the  mental  body, 
to  a  plane  of  purer  ideas  and  greater  bliss.  Still,  even 
this  is  but  a  temporary  heaven,  or  plane  of  observation, 
from  which  the  soul  can  look  back  and  study  the  various 
lives  through  which  it  has  passed,  thus  viewing  the  con- 
nection existing  between  the  successive  existences,  and 
appreciating  the  happy  and  unhappy  incidents  of  life 
in  their  proper  light  as  the  manifestation  of  the  opera- 
tions of  the  law  of  karma,  which  leaves  neither  act  nor 
thought  unpunished  or  unrewarded. 

If,  during  the  course  of  these  lives,  the  soul  has 
succeeded  in  cancelling  its  debt  to  karma,  and  has 
developed  the  qualities  that  compose  the  Buddhistic 
body,  it  ascends  into  yet  another  world,  much  closer 
to  God,  in  which  the  process  of  evolution  may  be 
continued  upon  a  plane  where  subsequent  reincarnations 
are  unnecessary.  But  if,  in  this  ascent,  the  demands 
of  karma  have  been  left  unsatisfied,  and  the  thoughts 
and  deeds  of  life  have  not  been  expiated,  the  soul  turns 
back  from  this  temporary  heaven,  to  pursue  its  life 
on  earth  once  more.  It  is  at  this  time  that  the  most 
important  purpose  of  the  causal  body  is  developed,  for 
it  is  through  the  operations  of  this  organ  that  the 
various  bodies  needed  as  a  covering  for  the  immaterial 
soul  are  reconstructed.  Thus,  step  by  step,  the  soul  that 


MAN'S  THEORIES  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY     253 

is  condemned  to  live  again,  enwraps  itself  in  its  different 
envelopes,  and,  in  this  manner,  it  finally  shuts  out  all 
recollection  of  the  past  lives  because  of  which  it  has 
been  judged  unworthy  to  ascend  to  the  higher  realms 
of  light  and  joy. 

While  these  are  by  no  means  the  only  opinions  that 
man  has  held  upon  these  ever  vital  subjects  of  com- 
templation,  they  are  suflScient  to  indicate  that  he  has 
so  far  failed  to  solve  the  mystery  that  envelops  the 
fact  of  being.  In  spite  of  all  his  speculation,  there  is 
but  one  fact  that  he  has  been  able  to  establish  to  his 
own  satisfaction.  He  is  here,  but  whence  he  came, 
and  whither  he  is  going,  or  why,  are  questions  to  which 
faith  alone  has  made  answer. 

Myths  as  to  the  Origin  of  Death. — Many  curious  beliefs 
have  been  held  by  savage  nations  as  to  the  cause  of  death 
— how  death  originally  came  into  the  world.  Taylor,  in 
his  Primitive  Culture,  tells  us  that  natural  deaths  are  by 
many  tribes  regarded  as  supernatural.  These  tribes 
have  no  conception  of  death  as  the  inevitable ;  as  the 
eventful  obstruction  and  cessation  of  the  powers  of  the 
bodily  machine ;  the  stopping  of  the  pulses  and  processes 
of  life  by  violence  or  decay  or  disease.  The  savage 
believes  that  the  only  real  death  is  due  to  accident,  or 
by  bewitching  the  unfortunate  patient.  He  knows 
nothing  of  "  natural "  death.  For  him,  man  would 
never  die  at  all,  if  he  were  not  bewitched,  or  if  some 
unfortunate  accident  did  not  carry  him  off.  Many  races 
in  Australia  hold  this  view.  The  negroes  in  Central 
Africa  have  very  much  the  same  belief.  Every  man 
who  dies  what  we  call  a  natural  death  is  really  killed  by 
witches !     The  Esquimaux  hold  similar  views. 

Myths  as  to  the  origin  of  death  are  numerous. 
Usually,  death  is  supposed  to  have  come  into  the  world, 


254  DEATH 

owing  to  some  sin  of  omission  (not  commission).  It  was 
due  to  the  fact  that  some  message  from  a  deity  was  not 
properly  delivered,  or  because  of  the  failure  to  live  up 
to  a  compact  with  the  gods.  Here  are  some  of  the 
Australian  myths.  "  The  first  created  man  and  woman 
were  told  not  to  go  near  a  certain  tree  in  which  a  bat 
lived.  One  day,  however,  the  woman  was  gathering 
firewood,  and  she  went  near  the  tree.  The  bat  flew 
away,  and  after  that  came  death."  Here  is  another : 
"  The  child  of  the  first  man  was  wounded.  If  his 
parents  could  have  healed  him,  death  would  never  have 
entered  the  world.  They  failed.  Death  came."  Some 
of  the  natives  of  Bengal  believe  that  death  came  into 
the  world  owing  to  one  of  their  number  having  bathed 
in  a  certain  pool  of  water,  which  was  forbidden.  The 
Greek  origin  of  death  is  too  well  known  to  need  re- 
statement. Pandora  and  her  box  will  always  live  in  the 
memory  of  lovers  of  art. 

In  New  Zealand  it  is  believed  that  death  came  because 
of  the  neglect  of  a  ritual  process.  The  Bushman  story  of 
the  origin  of  death  is  very  quaint :  "  The  mother  of  the 
little  hare  was  lying  dead  (but  we  do  not  know  how  she 
came  to  die).  The  moon  then  struck  the  little  hare  on 
the  lip,  cutting  it  open,  and  saying,  '  Cry  loudly,  for 
your  mother  will  not  return,  as  /  do,  but  is  quite  dead.' " 
There  are  several  variations  of  this  myth.  Some  natives 
believe  that  death  is  caused  by  a  snake  stealing  away 
souls  while  God  is  asleep  !  In  another  version,  a  woman 
offered  to  instruct  two  men  how  to  sleep.  "  She  held  the 
nostrils  of  one,  and  he  never  woke  at  all."  In  still  other 
cases,  death  was  due  to  direct  murder,  in  the  first  instance. 
In  Banks  Island  it  was  believed  that  death  came  in  order 
to  keep  down  the  population,  which  had  become  too 
numerous,  owing  to  man's  inherent  immortality ! 

According    to    the   Satapatha    BraJmiaiia,    death    was 


MAN'S  THEORIES  ABOUT  IMMORTALITY     255 

made,  like  the  gods  and  other  creatures,  by  a  being 
named  Prajapati.  "  Now,  of  Prajapati,  half  was  mortal, 
half  was  immortal.  With  this  mortal  half  he  feared 
death,  and  concealed  himself  from  death  in  earth  and 
water.  Death  said  to  the  gods  :  '  What  hath  become  of 
him  who  created  us  ? '  They  answered  :  '  Fearing  thee, 
hath  he  entered  the  earth.'  The  gods  and  Prajapati 
now  freed  themselves  from  the  dominion  of  death  by 
celebrating  an  enormous  number  of  sacrifices.  Death 
was  chagrined  by  their  escape  from  the  '  nets  and  clubs ' 
which  he  carried  in  the  Aitareya  Brahmana.  '  As  you 
have  escaped  me,  so  will  men  also  escape,'  he  grumbled. 
The  gods  appeased  him  by  the  promise  that,  in  the  hody, 
no  man  henceforth  for  ever  should  evade  death.  '  Every 
one  who  becomes  immortal  shall  do  so  by  first  parting 
with  his  body.'"     (See  also  Appendix  E.) 


CHAPTER   II 

THE   PHILOSOPHICAL  ASPECT  OF   DEATH  AND 
IMMORTALITY 

The  late  Professor  William  A.  Hammond,  of  Cornell 
University,  writing  upon  "  Immortality,"  asserted  that 
"  the  question  of  the  .  .  .  sm-vival  of  the  soul  is  not  a 
scientific  problem.  Positive  science  is  impotent  either 
to  prove  or  disprove  the  dogma,"  and  it  is  this  theory 
that  has  been  maintained  by  most  philosophers.  As 
Stahelin^  says: — 

"  We  might  take  up  a  line  of  argument  used  by  philosophy  both  in 
ancient  and  modern  times — from  Socrates  down  to  Fichte — to  prove 
the  immortality  of  the  inner  being,  an  argument  derived  from  the 
assertion  that  the  soul,  being  a  unity,  is,  as  such,  incapable  of 
decay,  it  being  only  in  the  case  of  the  complex  that  a  falling  to 
pieces,  or  a  dissolution,  is  conceivable.  .  .  .  But  the  abstruse 
nature  of  this  method  leads  us  to  renounce  a  line  of  argument 
from  which,  we  freely  confess,  we  expect  little  profitable  result. 
For,  after  all,  what  absolute  proof  have  we  of  this  unity  of  the 
soull  Can  we  subject  it  to  the  microscope,  or  the  scalpel,  as  we 
can  the  visible  and  tangible  ?  It  must  content  us  for  the  present 
simply  to  indicate  that  the  instinct  and  consciousness  of  immor- 
tality have  nothing  to  fear  from  the  most  searching  examination 
of  the  reason,  but  find  far  more  of  confirmation  and  additional 
proof  than  of  contradiction  in  the  profoundest  thinking.  Further, 
that  this  instinct  and  consciousness  do  actually  exist,  and  are 
traceable  through  all  the  stages  and  ramifications  of  the  human 


^  Foundations  of  our  Faith,  p.  232. 
256 


PHILOSOPHY  OF  DEATH  &  IMMORTALITY      257 

race  ...  is  confirmed  to  us  by  our  opponents  themselves  .  .  . 
that  there  is  in  man  something  which  is  deeper  and  stronger  than 
the  maxims  of  a  self -invented  philosophy,  namely,  the  divinely 
created  nobility  of  his  nature,  the  inherent  breath  of  life,  breathed 
into  him  by  God,  the  relation  to  the  Eternal,  which  secures  to  him 
eternity." 

Watson  goes  still  further,  even  to  the  extent  of 
declaring  ^  that  no  where  else  but  in  the  Bible  is 
there  any 

"indubitable  declaration  of  man's  immortality  .  .  .  any  facts 
or  principles  so  obvious  as  to  enable  us  confidently  to  infer  it. 
All  observation  lies  directly  against  the  doctrine  of  man's  im- 
mortality. He  dies,  and  the  probabilities  of  a  future  life,  which 
have  been  established  upon  the  unequal  distributions  of  rewards 
and  punishments  in  this  life,  and  the  capacities  of  the  human  soul, 
are  a  presumptive  evidence  that  have  been  adduced  .  .  .  only  by 
those  to  whom  the  doctrine  has  been  transmitted  by  tradition,  and 
who  were  therefore  in  possession  of  the  idea ;  and  even  then  to 
have  any  effectual  force  of  persuasion,  they  must  be  built  upon 
antecedent  principles  furnished  only  by  the  revelations  contained 
in  holy  Scriptures.  Hence  some  of  the  wisest  heathens,  who  were 
not  wholly  unaided  in  their  speculations  on  these  subjects  by  the 
reflected  light  of  these  revelations,  confessed  themselves  unable  to 
come  to  any  satisfactory  conclusion.  The  doubts  of  Socrates,  who 
expressed  himself  the  most  hopefully  of  any  on  the  subject  of 
a  future  life,  are  well  known ;  and  Cicero,  who  occasionally  ex- 
patiated with  so  much  eloquence  on  this  topic,  shows,  by  the 
sceptical  expressions  which  he  throws  in,  that  his  belief  was  by  no 
means  confirmed." 

The  first,  and,  parenthetically,  one  of  the  most  logical 
attempts  to  formulate  a  philosophical  tenet  on  the 
doctrine  of  immortality,  is  that  Avhich  is  contained  in 
Plato's  Phcedo.  It  was  upon  this  presentation  that  the 
Neo-Platonists  reared  their  argumentative  structure,  and 

^  Institutes,  vol.  ii,,  p.  2. 

R 


258  DEATH 

nearly  all  the  efforts  that  have  been  made  to  find  a 
logical  solution  to  this  problem,  since  that  work  was 
written,  have  been  adapted  from  it. 

The  Platonic  argument  for  the  immortality  of  the 
soul  maybe  summarily  stated  as  follows: — (1)  The  fact 
that  the  mind  brings  to  the  study  of  truth  a  body  of 
interpretive  principles  and  axioms  with  it,  as  part  of  its 
native  endoAvment,  shows  that  they  can  be  only  reminis- 
cential,  and,  therefore,  derived  from  a  pre-existent  state; 
(2)  the  soul  is  an  ultimate  unity — {i.e.  monadic  in 
character),  and,  therefore,  not  being  composite  or 
divisible,  it  cannot  be  disintegrated;  (3)  the  term 
"  soul "  means  the  "  principle  of  life,"  having  the  ideal 
of  life  essentially  immanent  in  it,  and  inseparable  from 
it,  and  therefore  it  must  exclude  the  opposite  idea, 
death;  (4)  the  soul  is  self-moving,  deriving  its  activity 
from  within ;  consequently  its  motion,  and,  therewith, 
its  life,  must  be  perpetual;  (5)  the  soul  as  an  immaterial 
reality  is  essentially  related  to  the  immaterial,  invisible, 
eternal  idea ;  and,  as  the  former  is  akin  to  the  latter  in 
nature,  so  is  it  also  akin  in  duration;  (6)  the  superior 
dignity  and  value  of  the  soul  argue  for  its  survival  of 
the  crass  body,  and  even  the  crass  body  persists  for 
a  time;  (7)  the  cyclical  movement  of  nature  shows 
everywhere  the  maintenance  of  life  by  opposition,  as 
night,  day ;  sleeping,  waking ;  the  dying  seed,  the 
germinating  flower  (this  is  an  argument  from  analogy ; 
out  of  the  decay  and  death  of  one  living  organism,  a 
new  life  is  generated) ;  (8)  the  instinctive  aspiration  of 
the  soul  towards  a  future  existence  shows  that  the  belief 
is  founded  on  natural  law;  (9)  things  that  are  de- 
structible are  destroyed  by  their  peculiar  evil  or 
disease ;  the  peculiar  evil  of  the  soul  is  vice,  which 
corrupts  the  soul's  nature,  but  does  not  destroy  its 
existence;    (10)    the    world    as    a    moral     and    natural 


PHILOSOPHY  OF  DEATH  &  IMMORTALITY      259 

world  demands  a  future  life  of  rewards  and  punish- 
ments for  the  rectification  of  inequalities  in  this  life, 
else  the  wrong  would  ultimately  triumph,  as  in  a  bad 
play.  This  argument  is  based  on  the  ethical  claim  that 
there  must  be  a  final  equivalence  between  inner  worth 
and  external  condition  or  reward.  The  views  of  the 
Greeks,  and  especially  the  vicAvs  of  Plato,  have  had 
a  profound,  an  incalculable  influence  on  Christian 
thought,  on  early  theological  formulae,  and  on  the 
sum  of  occidental  philosophy. 

The  discussions  of  the  dogma  of  immortality,  which 
attracted  so  much  attention  during  the  eighteenth 
and  nineteenth  centuries,  brought  no  more  satisfactory 
answer  to  this  riddle  of  existence.  In  fact,  most  philo- 
sophical writers,  who  kept  within  the  bounds  of  logic, 
came  to  Emerson's  admitted  conclusion  that  ''  we  cannot 
prove  our  faith  by  syllogisms."  The  French  materialists, 
for  example,  denied  absolutely  the  possibility  of  the 
presence  of  a  soul  and  the  existence  of  a  future  life, 
psychic  life  to  them  being  purely  an  organic  function. 
Not  less  materialistic  is  the  position  of  the  pantheists, 
headed  by  Spinoza,  for  they  held  that  the  World-Soul, 
which,  according  to  their  theories,  produces  and  fills  the 
universe,  also  fills  and  rules  man ;  that  it  is  only  in  him 
that  it  reaches  its  special  end — which  is  self- conscious- 
ness— and  attains  to  thought  and  will,  but  they  hold 
that,  at  the  death  of  the  individual,  this  World-Soul 
retreats  from  him,  just  as  the  setting  sun  seems  to  draw 
back  its  rays  into  itself;  so  self-consciousness  sinks  once 
more  into  the  great,  unconscious,  undistinguished  spirit- 
ocean  of  the  whole. 

In  its  effect  Schopenhauer's  doctrine  is  not  dissimilar. 
To  him  life  was  the  manifestation  of  the  Will-to-Live, 
and  death,  the  extinction  of  that  Will.  In  Fichte's 
system  of  Idealism,  the  creative   Ego  is  not   the  indi- 


260  DEATH 

vidual,  but  the  Absolute  Ego.  "  The  individual  Ego 
realises  itself  only  by  negating  its  individuality,  by 
universalising  itself,  and  the  Ego  thus  exemplifying  the 
conceptual  life  of  truth,  continues  to  all  eternity,  as  an 
indestructible  part  of  the  reality  of  the  Absolute  Ego." 
So  far  as  individual  existence  after  death  is  concerned, 
this  is  practically  the  absorption  of  the  Indian  Nirvana. 
Hegel,  personally,  paid  little  attention  to  the  problem  of 
life  and  death,  bat  his  disciples  were  split  into  two 
badly  divided  factions  upon  this  question  of  continued 
existence. 

Lotze,  in  his  teleological  idealism,  bases  his  theory  of 
the  immortality  of  the  soul  on  the  principle  of  value, 
taking  the  ground  that  a  thing  will  continue  for  ever 
which  by  reason  of  its  excellence  should  be  an  abiding 
constitutive  part  of  the  Cosmical  Order.  In  other  words, 
immortality,  in  his  opinion,  depended  upon  individual 
excellence,  and  was  not  the  fate  of  all  souls.  This  idea 
of  what  may  be  termed  "  conditional  immortality,"  was 
taught  by  M'Connell,  in  The  Evohition  of  Immortality  ;  by 
Dr.  Edward  White,  in  Conditional  Immortality,  or  Life  in 
Christ;  and,  later,  by  Professor  Henry  Drummond,  in 
Natural  Law  in  the  Sjnritual  World,  a  work  that  excited 
so  much  attention  that  more  than  one  hundred  thousand 
copies  were  sold. 

The  conditionalist  ar<?ues  that  the  soul  of  man  has  no 
inherent  right  to  immortality,  but  that  this  privilege  has 
been  acquired  through  the  operation  of  the  infinite  merits 
of  Jesus  Christ,  who,  by  his  triumph  over  death,  opened 
the  door  to  a  future  existence,  that  pure  spirits  might 
participate  with  him  in  the  joys  of  eternal  life.  The 
sinner  who  rejects  divine  grace,  however,  is  doomed  to 
disappear,  like  all  useless  organisms,  which,  in  the 
struggle  for  life,  fail  to  adapt  themselves  to  existing 
conditions. 


PHILOSOPHY  OF  DEATH  &  IMMORTALITY      261 

Kant,  Locke,  and  other  metaphysicians,  agree  with 
those  theologians  who  exclude  all  these  problems  as 
being  beyond  the  province  of  actual  scientific  demon- 
stration. They  hold  that  it  is  impossible  to  prove  a 
future  existence  from  a  belief  in  a  Creator,  regardless  of 
the  attributes  that  we  may  admit  that  such  a  Creator 
possesses.  As  Professor  Hammond  indicates,  however, 
in  the  article  already  quoted,  they  admit  that  "  the 
work  of  man  as  a  moral  being,  with  infinite  potentialities 
[i.e.  infinite  possibilities],  necessitates  an  infinite  time 
for  their  realisation."  The  laws  of  the  moral  life  are 
drawn  from  a  transcendental  sphere,  free  from  conditions 
of  time  and  space,  and  so  the  very  essence  of  man's 
moral  being  is  invested  with  the  eternal.  Man  is 
infinitely  progressive  and  perfectible  in  his  moral  and 
intellectual  evolution,  and  this  fact  points  indubit- 
ably to  a  further  existence.  If  death  were  the  end, 
the  moral  idea  would  be  illusory,  and  man  would 
perish  a  fragment.  An  infinite  moral  imperative  im- 
plies an  infinite  moral  ability.  Duty  demands  moral 
perfection.  Further,  the  moral  ideal  is  a  character-ideal, 
an  ideal  of  personal  aim,  which  implies  a  personal  destiny, 
and  the  non-illusoriness  of  the  moral  life  implies  the 
possibility  of  realising  its  ideal. 

Professor  Chase,  in  his  article  in  the  BiUiotheca  Sacra, 
February  1849,  assumed  a  somewhat  similar  position, 
although  he  expressed  the  conclusions  in  a  different  way, 
for  he  based  his  argument  chiefly  upon  the  gradual  and 
progressive  development  of  life  in  this  planet,  and  this 
development,  in  his  opinion,  when  taken  in  connection 
with  the  capacities  and  endowments  of  the  soul,  indicated, 
on  the  part  of  the  Creator,  a  purpose  to  continue  it  in 
being. 

Generally  speaking,  however,  the  conclusions  of  most 
philosophical  speculations  regarding  man's  destiny  arrive 


262  DEATH 

at  the  same  melancholy  finale,  that,  Avhatever  we  may 
accept  upon  faith,  or  however  strongly  we  may  hope  for  a 
continuance  of  existence  in  another  world,  there  are  no 
facts  to  demonstrate  that  the  tomb  does  not  write  the 
word  "  Finis  "  to  the  book  of  conscious  life.  It  was  such 
an  idea  as  this  that  Lord  Bacon  had  in  mind  when  he 
wrote : — 

"  Our  inquiries  about  the  nature  of  the  soul  must  be  bound  over 
at  last  to  religion,  for  otherwise  they  still  lie  open  to  many  errors ; 
for,  since  the  substance  of  the  soul  was  not  deduced  from  the  mass 
of  heaven  and  earth,  but  immediately  from  God,  how  can  the  know- 
ledge of  the  reasonable  soul  be  derived  from  philosophy  1 " 

And  even  Alger  confesses : — 

"  The  majestic  theme  of  our  immortality  allures  yet  baffles  us. 
No  fleshly  implement  of  logic  or  cunning  tact  of  brain  can  reach 
the  solution.  That  secret  lies  in  a  tissueless  realm,  whereof  no 
nerve  can  report  beforehand.  We  must  wait  a  little.  Soon  we 
shall  grasp  and  guess  no  more,  but  grasp  and  know." 

Although  scarcely  intended  to  do  so  by  the  author  of 
The  Critical  History  of  the  Doctrine  of  a  Future  Life,  in  the 
light  of  modern  investigations  the  words  ring  with  all  the 
promise  of  prophecy. 


CHAPTER   III 

THE   THEOLOGICAL  ASPECT   OF  DEATH  AND 
IMMORTALITY  1 

Cicero  defined  death  as  "  the  departure  of  the  rnrnd  from 
the  body,"  and,  if  the  term  "  soul "  should  be  substituted 
for  the  word  "  mind,"  this  definition  would  give  a  very 
accurate  impression  of  the  theological  view  of  the  physi- 
cal aspect  of  this  common  phenomenon.  Thus,  Tertullian 
describes  death  as  ''  the  disunion  of  the  body  and  soul," 
and,  unsatisfactory  as  this  definition  may  be  in  many 
respects,  it  is  quite  as  explanatory  as  most  of  the  conclu- 
sions that  have  been  reached  by  philosophers  and  scien- 
tists. Of  course  it  is  easy  to  see  that,  even  granting  the 
existence  of  the  soul,  death  would  not  consist  in  this 
separation  between  the  material  and  the  spiritual  parts  of 
our  being.  Such  a  separation  would  occur,  but  it  would 
be  the  consequence  of  the  death  of  the  body,  and  not  the 
cause  of  it.  To  say  that  death  is  the  "  termination  "  of 
life,  therefore,  is  to  parry  the  question.  Spencer's  "  cessa- 
tion of  life  "  definition  is  not  more  evasive. 

So  far  as  theology  is  concerned,  however,  it  has  no 
better  terms  in  which  to  describe  the  termination  of  life, 
towards  which  every  human  being  is  tending ;  so  it  satis- 
fies itself  by  accepting  this  single  general  conclusion,  and 

1  A  very  good  summary  of  what  may  be  considered  the  theological 
aspect  of  death  is  to  be  found  in  Mr.  H.  M.  Alden's  volume,  A  Study  of 
Death.  The  author  makes  death  and  sin  synonymous  terms,  and  uses 
them  in  that  manner  throughout  his  work.  His  book  is,  consequently,  of 
no  use  to  a  scientific  writer,  and  has  only  historical  and  religious  interest. 

263 


264  DEATH 

presenting  several  theories  in  explanation  of  the  pheno- 
mena that  it  cannot  adequately  define.  Thus,  since  the 
days  of  St.  Augustine,  accepted  orthodox  theology  has 
held  that  as  sin  and  death  came  into  the  world  through 
Adam's  violation  of  the  commands  of  God,  it  was  not 
until  the  second  Adam — Jesus  Christ — came  that  the 
penalty  of  the  first  man's  disobedience  was  provisionally 
forgiven  and  the  birthright  of  immortality  restored  to 
man.  That  this  is  the  literal  teaching  of  the  Bible  there 
can  be  no  question,  nor  was  it  questioned  to  any  consider- 
able degree  in  its  application  to  either  animal  or  man, 
until  the  time  that  the  discoveries  of  geology  demon- 
strated the  prevalence  of  death  in  ages  long  anterior  to 
the  creation  of  man,  or  countless  ages  before  the  appear- 
ance of  sin,  as  described  in  the  Book  of  Genesis.  The 
earth's  strata  are  full  of  the  remains  of  extinct  life — life 
that  existed,  died,  and  was  buried  by  the  slow  process  of 
nature  during  periods  that  greatly  antedated  the  appear- 
ance of  any  civilised  race.  Even  before  primitive  man 
had  left  a  mark  to  indicate  his  occupancy  of  the  earth 
there  was  life,  some  of  which  had  already  become  extinct, 
and  it  is  easy  to  determine,  from  an  examination  of  these 
fossil  remains,  that  in  those  periods  life  was  inevitably 
followed  by,  and  in  many  instances  actually  sustained  by, 
death. 

As  the  result,  most  theologians  now  admit  that,  long 
before  the  period  of  man's  innocence,  the  phenomena  of 
death  had  its  place  in  the  economy  of  the  world.  Even 
then  the  revolving  years  were  marked  by  the  opening 
and  closing  of  the  earth's  foliage ;  by  the  ripening,  con- 
summation, and  decay  of  the  earth's  fruits.  When  our  first 
parents  went  to  drink  of  the  waters  of  the  streams  in 
Paradise,  every  draught  they  took  to  quench  their  thirst 
required  the  destruction  of  myriads  of  animalculae,  just  as 
the  drinking  of  water  does  to-day.     If  they  walked  in 


THEOLOGY  OF  DEATH  &  IMMORTALITY  265 

the  fields,  or  plucked  fruits  or  vegetables  to  gratify  the 
demands  of  hunger,  each  act  brought  death  to  some 
creature  that  had  hitherto  experienced  the  joy  of  living. 
In  fact  theology,  as  represented  by  most  theologians,  now 
agrees  with  the  assumption  of  science,  that  this  state  of 
things  has  existed  since  the  earliest  days  of  the  creation 
of  life,  and  that,  in  fact,  death  is  the  logical  ultimate  of 
the  law  of  life  under  which  God,  in  His  good  pleasure, 
placed  all  creatures  that  He  made,  with  the  single  excep- 
tion of  man. 

In  the  case  of  man,  the  last  and  highest  creation  of  the 
Divine  will,  the  idea  of  death  was  immediately  set  before 
him  as  the  consequence,  or,  in  fact,  the  just  desert  that 
must  follow  his  disobedience  of  the  law  of  his  Maker, 
and  there  is  every  reason  to  believe  that  his  very  clear 
conception  of  the  import  of  this  threatening  evil  was  de- 
rived directly  from  the  ever-apparent  evidence  of  death's 
dominion  over  the  beasts  of  the  field,  the  fowls  of  the 
air,  and  all  things  that  came  up  out  of  the  earth. 

With  regard  to  the  animals,  or  to  creatures  possessing 
what  may  be  termed  "  mere  instinct,"  theology  finds 
nothing  that  indicates  that  there  is  anything  judicial  in 
their  ordination  to  death.  It  is  man  that  has  been 
punished  in  this  manner,  and  yet,  for  some  reason  that  is 
often  unexplained,  the  curse  from  which  he  has  suftered 
has  also  "  been  brought  upon  the  ground,"  with  the  result 
that  "  the  whole  creation  groaneth  and  travaileth  in  pain 
together."  Just  how  this  arrangement  of  affairs  is  to  be 
reconciled  with  the  idea  of  a  benevolent  Creator  is  one 
of  those  problems  which  many  theologians  have  found 
it  difficult  to  solve,  but  one  explanation  is  given  by 
M'Clintock  and  Strong  : — 

"  It  may  relieve  the  mystery  that,  as  a  general  rule,  the  enjoy- 
ments of  the  inferior  creatures  greatly  exceed  their  suiferings,  and 
death  is  but  little,  if  at  all,  the  object  of  their  fear,  or  even  a  cause 


266  DEATH 

of  mucli  pain.  That  'the  sum  of  animal  enjoyment  quenched  in 
death  is  amply  compensated  by  the  law  of  increase  and  succession, 
which  both  perpetuates  life  and  preserves  it  in  the  vigour  of  its 
powers  and  the  freshness  of  its  joys  is  certain ' ;  also  (as  bearing 
on  the  physical  and  moral  condition  of  man,  to  whom,  as  chief 
in  this  lower  world,  all  arrangements  and  disposals  affecting  the 
lower  forms  of  life  were  subordinated)  their  subjection  to  death 
has  enlarged  immensely  the  extent  of  man's  physical  resources, 
and  multiplied  manifold  the  means  of  his  mental  development  and 
discipline." 

Theology  holds  that,  as  "  it  is  appointed  unto  all  men 
once  to  die,"  death  is  actually  a  physical  necessity  devised 
by  the  Creator  as  a  means  of  carrying  out  His  purposes 
regarding  the  welfare  of  the  human  race,  and,  being  such, 
it  has  become  a  universal  law  which  now  extends  to  all 
organisations  in  the  material  universe.  This  is  an  opinion 
that  has  long  been  held  by  exponents  of  nearly  all  schools 
of  theological  thought. 

At  the  same  time,  as  it  would  be  contrary  to  the 
doctrine  of  God's  omnipotence  to  urge  that  such  a  law 
must  operate  despite  His  desire  to  maintain  the  fulfil- 
ment of  the  law  of  life,  it  is  held  that  there  are  other 
orders  of  creation  dwelling  on  an  immortal  plane  who 
are  not  subject  to  this  condition,  the  ultimate  fate  of 
every  human  being.  It  is  also  held  that  these  creatures 
are  constituted  of  some  kind  of  material,  or,  in  other 
words,  that  so  far  from  being  all  spirit,  they  have  their 
own  form  of  organised  existence.  And  in  evidence  of 
this,  we  are  pointed  to  the  fact  that  the  bodies  of  the  risen 
saints  were  "  clothed  with  incorruption  and  immortality." 

Theology  also  contends  that  even  these  frail  bodies  of 
ours,  in  the  antediluvian  period,  were  able  to  prolong 
the  objective  existence  to  the  verge  of  a  millennium'V 
and  it  is  argued  from  this  that  it  is  quite  possible  for 
God  to  imbue  the  human  organism  with  the  power,  or 


THEOLOGY  OF  DEATH  &  IMMORTALITY     267 

the  means,  of  repairing  the  waste  of  the  forces  of  Ufe 
in  such  manner  as  to  preserve  man  in  unabated  vigour 
and  freshness,  even  to  the  end  of  time.  It  was  un- 
doubtedly this  belief  in  God's  power  to  find  a  means 
to  suspend  all  laws  of  His  own  creation  that  gave  rise 
to  the  legend  of  the  Wandering  Jew,  which  was  so 
commonly  accepted  throughout  the  entire  civilised 
world  a  few  centuries  ago.  According  to  this  story, 
the  Jew  was  punished  for  his  insult  to  Jesus  by  being 
condemned  to  travel  ceaselessly  until  the  Christ  should 
come  again  in  glory  on  "  the  last  day." 

According  to  the  covenant  that  was  originally  given 
to  man,  he  was  to  remain  exempt  from  the  operation 
of  this  law  of  death  so  long  as  he  remained  obedient 
to  the  divine  command :  "  Thou  shalt  not  eat  of  the 
tree  of  knowledge  of  good  and  evil,  for  in  the  day  thou 
eatest  thereof  thou  shalt  surely  die."  Again,  after  this 
law  or  command  had  been  violated,  the  Bible  is  equally 
explicit  in  ascribing  the  beginning  of  the  reign  of 
death  over  mankind  to  the  transo^ression  of  this  law : 
"  By  one  man  sin  entered  into  the  world,  and  death  by 
sin ;  and  so  death  passed  upon  all  men,  for  that  all 
have  sinned." 

Drawing  its  conclusions  from  such  passages  of  Scrip- 
ture, theology  assumes  that  immortality  was  actually 
originally  ordained  for  man,  but  that  it  was  only  pro- 
visionally ordained.  Death  was  the  penalty  that  would 
be  imposed  for  the  violation  of  the  covenant.  As  long 
as  man  remained  steadfast  to  his  agreement  with  God, 
the  latter  would  abide  by  the  conditions  of  His  sacra- 
mental pledge;  and  it  was  due  to  man's  transgression 
of  the  law  that  he  was  compelled  to  pay  the  price  of 
his  sin  by  renouncing  the  gift  of  immortality  that  had 
been  promised  to  him  and  to  his  offspring. 

In  regard  to  other  forms  of  creation,  however,  there 


268  DEATH 

is  no  indication  in  these  passages  of  Scripture  that  they 
had  also  been  inchided  in  the  provisions  of  this  contract. 
It  was  man  only  to  whom  the  law  applied,  and  it  is 
argued,  therefore,  that  the  other  orders  of  creatures  that 
may  have  lived  in  that  time  or  in  preceding  stages 
of  the  world's  existence,  were  exempt,  both  from  the 
necessity  of  obedience  to  the  law  and  from  the  penalty 
required  in  case  of  its  violation. 

Whether,  in  any  way,  they  may  have  been  con- 
stituted under  a  law  of  death  by  anticipation,  and  as 
in  keeping  with  a  state  of  things  in  which  death  should 
reign  over  man,  we  do  not  venture  to  pronounce.  That, 
indirectly,  as  a  consequence  of  their  relation  to  man 
as  a  sinner  against  God,  their  sufferings  have  been 
increased  and  their  lives  shortened,  it  is  impossible  to 
doubt  or  deny.  But  if,  in  this  view,  sin  be  the  occasion 
of  their  death,  it  cannot  be  the  cause  of  it.  They  are 
incapable  of  sin,  and  cannot  die  judicially  for  sin.  The 
contrary  opinion  which  long  and  generally  prevailed, 
that  the  creatures  were  immortal  until  man  sinned,  has 
as  little  to  justify  it  in  Scripture  as  in  science.  Death, 
it  is  there  said,  is  the  law  of  their  being ;  and  the  true 
doctrine  of  the  Scripture  is  not  that  they  die  because 
man  has  sinned,  but  that  man  because  he  has  sinned 
has  forfeited  his  original  and  high  distinction,  and  has 
become  "  like  the  beasts  that  perish."  It  is  unnecessary 
to  multiply  Scripture  proofs  of  this  awful  and  humbling 
truth.  Every  one  is  familiar  with  the  frequent  and 
equivalent  testimonies  that  death  is  "  the  fruit,"  "  the 
wages,"  "  the  end "  and  consummation  of  sin,  and  the 
circumstances  which  attend  and  induce  it  impressively 
connect  it  with  sin  as  its  cause. 

In  order  to  argue  that  death,  now  that  it  has  come, 
does  not  necessarily  mean  the  end  of  all  life  ;  theologians 
have  assumed  that,  in  addition  to  the  objective  body, 


THEOLOGY  OF  DEATH  &  IMMORTALITY  269 

each  human  being  possesses  a  soul  or  spirit.  In  this 
opinion,  of  course,  they  differ  from  the  materialist,  who 
holds  that  man  is  composed  of  a  physical  body  alone ; 
that,  in  fact,  he  is  no  more  than  a  superior  animal, 
whose  mental  and  moral  strength  are  merely  the  effect 
of  the  higher  development  of  this  physical  organism. 
To  the  materialist,  the  theory  that  man  is  possessed  of 
a  soul  distinct  from  the  body,  and  that  it  is  this  soul 
that  is  the  seat  of  the  nobler  intelligence,  is  the  height 
of  absurdity.  To  the  theologian,  however,  this  belief  is 
a  necessity,  for  if  it  were  not  for  the  existence  of  this 
spiritual  part  of  man,  it  would  be  impossible  to  show 
that  death,  instead  of  being  the  end  of  all  things,  is 
really  a  second  birth — a  birth  into  another,  a  more 
important,  and  an  eternal  state  of  being. 

As  evidence  of  the  existence  of  the  soul,  the  theo- 
logian points  to  numerous  passages  of  Scripture,  for  the 
books  of  the  New  Testament  are  filled  with  testimony 
that  conclusively  establishes  the  truth  of  this  theory, 
provided  we  are  Avilling  to  accept  them  as  authoritative. 
According  to  these  passages,  man's  intercourse  with  the 
outward  existence  is  through  the  body,  which  is  entirely 
objective  in  its  mode  of  operation,  but  his  communion 
with  God  and  his  ability  to  attain  any  degree  of  spiritual 
development  comes  to  him  through  the  soul,  or  spiritual 
self  that,  while  associated  with  the  body,  is  a  distinct 
and  different  organism. 

The  effect  of  this  complexity  of  being  not  only 
appears  in  the  affairs  of  life,  but  also  tends  to  com- 
plicate the  nature  and  the  result  of  death.  If  man  had 
his  body  alone,  it  would  be  easy  to  dispose  of  such  a 
problem,  for  death  extends  to  every  part  of  the  body, 
and  includes  every  portion  of  his  objective  nature.  In 
this  manner  the  threat  that  death  should  follow  the 
violation    of    the    divine    command    has    been    literally 


270  DEATH 

enforced.  Man  does  die  or  perish,  so  far  as  his  earthly 
body  is  concerned.  The  important  question  is  in  regard 
to  the  other  self — the  soul,  the  spirit,  through  which  he, 
in  accordance  with  tlie  Biblical  promise,  may  eventually 
experience  far  greater  joys  of  living. 

In  reading  the  Bible  it  is  easy  to  discover  that 
reference  is  made  to  two  kinds  of  death — the  death  of 
the  body  and  the  death  of  the  soul — or  a  spiritual 
death  as  well  as  a  material  death.  In  other  words, 
while  condemning  the  outward  or  objective  man  to 
experience  "  the  pangs  of  death "  as  a  punishment  for 
his  sins,  God  does  not  permit  the  inner  man — the  actual 
cause  of  that  sin — to  escape  the  penalty.  On  the  con- 
trary, the  Scripture  assures  us  that  the  soul  that  sinneth 
shall  surely  die,  and  there  are  many  references  that 
might  be  made  to  passages  that  indicate  that  it  is 
possible  to  be  dead  in  sin  while  yet  alive  in  the  objec- 
tive or  physical  body. 

Precisely  what  effect  God's  penalty  has  upon  the 
body  and  soul,  both  severally  and  together,  constitute 
questions  over  which  there  has  been  considerable  dis- 
pute. According  to  some  theologians,  it  is  the  actual 
physical  body  that  is  to  be  raised  from  the  grave  on 
the  "  last  day."  In  the  opinion  of  others,  the  physical 
body  will  play  no  part  in  this  resurrection,  but,  being 
dead,  will  perish  for  all  time,  while  the  soul  alone  Avill 
be  called  upon  to  account  for  the  sins  committed  in  the 
flesh. 

Naturally,  the  literal  effect  of  death  upon  the  bodily 
organism  is  a  matter  of  common  observation.  When 
death  comes,  the  body  soon  loses  its  comeliness.  Corrup- 
tion follows,  and  finally,  the  structure  that  was  once  a 
human  form  becomes  a  shapeless  mass  of  dust.  That 
this  dust  should  be  brought  together  again,  to  serve 
once  more  as  the  soul's  envelope  during  eternity,  is  an 


THEOLOGY  OF  DEATH  &  IMMORTALITY  271 

idea  that  is  branded  as  absurd  by  nearly  all  so-called 
rational  thinkers.  In  spite  of  its  apparent  absurdity, 
however,  this  theory  has  been  very  generally  held  by 
nearly  all  schools  of  theology,  and  it  is  still  accepted  by 
many  Christian  sects,  some  of  which  could  scarcely  be 
designated  as  "  primitive." 

Whatever  disposition  may  be  made  of  the  body,  all 
creeds  admit  the  eventual  immortality  of  at  least  a 
certain  number  of  the  souls  of  those  who  have  died. 
Just  when  this  eternity  of  bliss  is  to  open  its  doors  to 
the  waiting  soul,  or  to  what  degree  divine  mercy  will 
operate  in  extending  the  scope  of  the  plan  of  redemption, 
are  among  the  many  questions  that  are  still  in  dispute. 
One  school,  more  liberal  than  the  others,  grants  eventual 
salvation  to  all  mankind ;  another  school — the  Roman 
Catholic  Church — provides  an  intermediate  state,  or 
place  of  purification,  in  which  those  who  do  not  merit 
eternal  damnation  may  expiate  the  sins  committed  in 
this  life ;  while  the  several  schools  of  Protestant  theo- 
logy differ  in  their  conceptions  of  the  plans  of  divine 
justice — ranging  from  the  ultimate  salvation  of  all,  as 
preached  by  the  most  liberal  Christians,  to  the  final  and 
absolute  extinction  of  the  wicked,  a  doctrine  that  seems 
to  have  lost  many  of  its  adherents  during  the  past  few 
years. 

Unpopular  as  this  belief  may  have  become,  Hudson, 
in  his  Laiv  of  Psychic  Phenomena,  insists  that  it  is  the 
only  logical  view  of  the  situation.     He  says : — 

"  The  first  proposition  of  my  theory  is  that  the  death  or 
practical  extinction  of  the  soul  as  a  conscious  entity  is  the  neces- 
sary result  of  unbelief  in  immortality.  The  second  proposition 
is  that  the  soul,  having  attained  immortality  through  belief,  is 
then  subject  to  the  law  of  rewards  and  punishments,  '  according 
to  the  deeds  done  in  the  body.'  The  same  propositions  are  more 
sententiously  expressed  in  Romans  ii.  1 2  :  '  For  as  many  as  have 


272  DEATH 

sinned  without  law  shall  also  perish  without  law :  and  as  many 
as  have  sinned  in  the  law  shall  be  judged  by  the  law.' 

"In  other  words,  the  condition  precedent  to  the  attainment  of 
immortality,  or  salvation — that  is,  the  saving  of  the  soul  from 
death — is  belief.  The  condition  precedent  to  the  attainment  of 
eternal  bliss,  and  the  avoidance  of  the  punishments  incident  to 
sin,  is  righteousness. 

"  Again,  we  find  a  spiritual  penalty  following  a  violation  of 
spiritual  law  in  what  Christ  taught  regarding  the  sin  against  the 
Holy  Ghost.  Just  what  that  sin  consists  in,  never  has  been  satis- 
factorily defined.  We  are  told  that  it  is  a  sin  that  cannot  be 
forgiven.  It  must  therefore  consist  of  a  violation  of  some  funda- 
mental law  of  the  soul's  existence,  the  penalty  for  which  is  inevit- 
able according  to  the  fixed  laws  of  God.  It  cannot  be  a  moral 
offence,  consisting  simply  in  wrong-doing,  for  such  sins  can  be 
atoned  for.  ...  It  must,  therefore,  be  the  sin  of  unbelief,  and 
consist  of  a  blasphemous  denial  of  the  existence  of  the  soul  and 
its  Father,  God.  This  would  be  in  strict  accordance  with  the 
fundamental  law  of  suggestion." 

So  far  as  the  popular  vie^v  of  death  and  life  after  death 
is  concerned,  it  now  differs  widely  from  the  position  that 
theology  must  take  when  it  decides  to  stand  by  the 
logical  aspect  of  the  question.  According  to  the  popular 
impression,  the  souls  of  those  who  die  go  directly  to  the 
seat  of  judgment,  and  remain  eternally  in  the  realm  of 
bliss  if  they  are  able  to  establish  their  worthiness  to 
participate  in  this  glorious  existence  of  the  blessed. 
That  this  idea  is  suggested  by  preachers  and  teachers  of 
religion  there  can  be  no  doubt,  but  it  is  equally  certain 
that  the  Bible  nowhere  presents  any  such  theory.  On 
the  contrary,  it  teaches  that,  as  sin  and  death  came  into 
the  world  through  Adam,  it  was  through  Christ,  the 
sacrifice,  that  they  have  been  overcome.  It  was  Christ 
alone  who  came  sinless  into  the  world,  and  who  lived  a 
sinless  life ;  it  was  Christ  alone  who  arose  triumphant 
over  death,  and  it  is  through   the  acceptance  of  Christ 


THEOLOGY  OF  DEATH  &  IMMORTALITY  273 

alone  that  the  soul  can  be  saved.  This  is  the  promise 
of  the  Bible  :  that  he  who  believes  in  Christ,  and  who 
lives  in  accord  with  that  faith,  shall  have  eternal  life, 
but  no  salvation  is  promised  for  those  who  fail  to  take 
advantage  of  this  opportunity.  In  fact,  for  the  unbe- 
liever, the  best  that  is  offered  is  eternal  darkness.  To 
him  the  eternity  that  is  to  be  so  blissful  an  experience 
for  the  faithful  Christian  becomes  a  burden,  a  period  of 
ceaseless  torment — either  of  mind  or  body — a  time  of 
"  weeping,  and  wailing,  and  gnashing  of  teeth." 

This,  in  brief,  is  the  position  to  which  the  logical 
student  of  theology  must  turn,  contradictory  though  it 
may  be  to  the  popular  view  upon  these  questions,  for 
there  can  be  no  doubt  that  this  is  the  literal  gospel 
that  is  taught  in  the  Bible.  The  sin  of  Adam,  which 
separated  him  from  God,  and  which  sent  him  flying  with 
fear  from  the  Garden  of  Eden,  began  its  disrupting  work 
at  the  very  moment  of  his  transgression.  The  act  of 
treason — the  violation  of  the  covenant — intercepted  the 
happy  intercourse  that  had  existed  between  God  the 
Maker,  and  man  His  creature.  In  this  manner  God's 
contract  was  instantly  fulfilled.  Man  had  sinned,  and 
God  ceased  to  live  with  him.  The  law  of  God  had  been 
broken,  the  fruit  of  the  forbidden  tree  had  been  eaten, 
and  death,  through  this  sin,  was  brought  into  the  life  of 
the  man — the  one  creature  of  earth  to  whom  the  provi- 
sional promise  of  immortality  had  been  given.  "  In  the 
day  thou  eatest  thou  shalt  surely  die,"  God  had  said,  and 
in  the  day  that  he  ate  the  work  of  death  began  in  the 
creature's  disrupted  relations  with  the  Creator. 

Although  these  conditions  are  sufficient  to  cause  death 
(and  death  without  delay),  through  the  mercy  of  God,  as 
displayed  in  the  plan  of  atonement,  man  lives  on  in  the 
body  for  a  little  time,  that  he  may  have  an  opportunity 
to  take  advantage  of  the  new  covenant  that  God  has 


274  DEATH 

made  with  him.  Tlirough  the  expiation  of  the  Cross 
the  doors  of  eternal  life  have  been  opened  once  more, 
that  he  who  will  may  enter.  The  price  that  must  be 
paid  is  faith  plus  works,  and  to  every  man  is  given  the 
chance  to  win  this  prize  which  was  once  lost  through 
Adam's  sin  :  immortality — not  immortality  in  this  life 
indeed,  but  in  a  life  that  lies  beyond  the  grave.  Thus, 
whatever  the  result  of  God's  forbearance  and  mercy  to 
each  individual  soul,  the  physical  man  must  still  die. 
In  theology  this  mortal  crisis  which  each  and  all  must 
face  is  known  as  the  "  temporal "  death,  to  distinguish 
it  from  the  "  spiritual  "  death,  which  makes  it  possible 
for  a  man  to  be  "  dead  while  he  liveth." 

When  this  point  has  been  reached,  when  this  dread 
day  has  come,  theology  recognises  but  one  more  step 
before  the  complete  and  final  issue  is  attamed,  for  when 
the  last  plans  of  the  divine  administration  have  been 
realised,  and  the  God  who  created  all  things  is  ready  to 
take  His  own  unto  Himself,  the  bodies  of  all  who  have 
slept  in  dust  will  be  reorganised ;  both  the  just  and  the 
unjust  shall  rise  from  their  graves  to  stand  with  the 
quick  before  their  judge,  that  they  may  give  account  of 
their  experience  in  the  flesh,  and  be  judged  in  accord- 
ance with  their  deserts.  It  is  then  that  the  just  shall 
be  raised  by  faith  through  grace  to  the  life  eternal  and 
incorruptible,  while  the  unjust,  the  unbeliever,  and  im- 
penitent sinner  shall  go  away  from  God's  presence  into 
the  place  of  everlasting  punishment  which  is  devised  for 
the  "  resurrection  of  damnation."  It  is  this  that  is  meant 
by  "  the  second  death." 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE   COMMON   ARGUMENTS   FOR   IMMORTALITY 

While  it  is  true  that  positive  science  has  been  unable 
— with  microscope  or  scalpel — to  find  the  smallest  trace 
of  an  immortal  spark  in  man  ;  while  theology  has  nothing 
more  evidential  to  offer  than  an  appeal  based  upon  the 
presumptive  accuracy  of  its  revelation,  and  philosophy 
stands  ready  to  confess  its  inability  to  cope  with  the 
problems  of  death  and  the  continuance  of  conscious 
existence,  the  great  majority  of  human  beings  are  quite 
as  confident  of  the  reality  of  the  next  world  as  it  would 
be  possible  for  them  to  be  if  their  theories  were  sup- 
ported by  the  most  conclusive  scientific  evidence.  Of 
course,  as  has  been  shown,  the  inability  of  man  to  demon- 
strate the  mere  existence  of  the  soul  to  the  satisfaction 
of  any  law  of  logic  leaves  mankind  absolutely  dependent 
upon  the  hope  that  is  in  him,  that  instinctive  desire  for 
immortality,  the  arguments  for  which  are  so  beautifully 
summarised  by  Addison  : — 

^'  Plato,  thou  reason'st  well, 
Else  whence  this  pleasing  hope^  this  fond  desire, 
This  longing  after  immortality  ? 
Or  whence  this  secret  dread,  and  inward  horror 
Of  falling  into  naught  ?     Why  shrinks  the  soul 
Back  on  herself,  and  startles  at  destruction  ? 
'Tis  the  divinity  that  stirs  within  us  ; 
'Tis  heaven  itself  that  points  out  an  hereafter, 
And  intimates  eternity  to  man."  ^ 

1  Cato. 
275 


276  DEATH 

True  as  these  words  may  be,  if  we  are  to  regard  them 
solely  as  a  picture  of  man's  protest  against  the  doctrine 
of  extinction,  they  are  not  of  the  faintest  evidential  value 
in  support  of  the  belief  that  life  continues  beyond  the 
grave.      In  fact,  as  Hudson  has  said  :  ^ — 

"  Natural  theology  stands  precisely  where  it  did  when  Thales 
philosophised  and  Simonides  sang  ;  and  the  arguments  are  iden- 
tical with  those  which  Socrates  employed  in  his  confutation  of  the 
atheism  of  Aristodemus.  Not  one  of  the  physical  sciences  in 
which  we  excel  the  Idumeans  has  advanced  us  one  step  in  solution 
of  the  great  problem  propounded  by  Job,  '  If  a  man  die,  shall  he 
live  again  1 ' " 

Professor  Hammond  mentions  five  traditional  argu- 
ments that  have  commonly  been  used  to  establish  the 
fact  that  death  is  not  the  end  of  conscious  being.  These 
are : — 

"(1)  The  ontological  argument,  which  bases  immortality  on  the 
immateriality,  simplicity,  and  irreducibility  of  the  soul-substance  ; 
(2)  The  teleological  argument,  which  employs  the  concept  of  man's 
destiny  and  function,  his  disposition  to  free  himself  more  and  more 
from  the  conditions  of  time  and  space,  and  to  develop  completely 
his  intellectual  and  moral  potentialities,  which  development  is 
impossible  under  the  conditions  of  earthly  life ;  (3)  The  theo- 
logical argument :  the  wisdom  and  justice  of  God  guarantee  the 
self-realisation  of  personal  beings  whom  He  has  created  ;  (4)  The 
moral  argument,  i.e.  the  moral  demand  for  the  ultimate  equival- 
ence of  personal  deserts  and  rewards,  which  equivalence  is  not 
found  in  life ;  (5)  The  historical  argument ;  the  fact  that  the 
belief  is  widespread  and  ancient,  showing  it  to  be  deep-seated  in 
human  nature,  and  the  historical  fact  of  the  resurrection  of  Christ 
and  the  statements  of  the  New  Testament  Scriptures." 

As  all  of  these  arguments  have  already  been  con- 
sidered in  previous  chapters,  it  is  unnecessary  to  dwell 
upon  them  further,  except  to  the  degree  in  which  they 

A  Scientific  Dernonstration  of  the  Future  Life,  p.  27. 


COMMON  ARGUMENTS  FOR  IMMORTALITY     277 

apply  to  the  arguments  that  are  in  more  common  use 
among  men  ;  for  while  many  of  us  may  be  unable  to 
follow  the  philosophers  and  logicians  through  the  intri- 
cate mazes  of  reasoning  that  lead  to  their  ultimate 
conclusions,  there  are  certain  arguments — more  com- 
mon-place, perhaps — that  appeal  to  ordinary  thinkers  as 
extremely  convincing.  As  Hudson  says  in  A  Scientific 
Demonstration  of  the  Future  Life  : — 

"  It  may  sound  very  unscientific,  but  I  must  confess  that  I 
attach  more  of  scientific  value  to  Emerson's  dogmatic  assertion 
that  '  man  is  to  live  hereafter '  than  I  do  to  the  aggregate  of 
philosophical  speculations  known  to  the  literature  of  the  subject. 
He  was  one  of  those  pure,  lofty,  and  poetic  souls  whose  intuitive 
perception  and  recognition  of  truth  is  oftentimes  as  perfect  as  a 
mathematical  demonstration." 

And  there  are  many  individuals  who,  whether  their 
process  of  reasoning  is  scientific  or  not,  will  heartily 
agree  with  this  statement. 

Of  course,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  there  are  but  two 
methods  of  reason  that  can  be  applied  logically  to  any 
question.  One  is  inductive  reasoning — the  reasoning 
which  begins  with  accepted  facts,  or  particulars,  and 
from  them  argues  up  to  the  last  logical  conclusions. 
The  other  is  deductive  reasoning,  or  the  reasoning  that 
begins  with  conclusions,  and  from  them  argues  down 
to  facts.  Inductive  reasoning,  therefore,  is  a  logical 
appeal  to  fact ;  whereas  deductive  reasoning  takes  the 
facts  that  have  been  obtained  more  or  less  inductively, 
and  from  them  proceeds  to  calculate  its  logical  par- 
ticulars. While  both  methods  of  reasoning  are  perfectly 
legitimate,  therefore,  both  are  liable  to  be  mistaken  in 
their  conclusions,  for  both  depend  upon  the  accuracy  of 
the  facts,  or  observations,  upon  which  these  conclusions 
are  based. 


278  DEATH 

As  may  easily  be  imagined,  the  exponents  of  the 
doctrine  of  life  after  death  have  found  it  extremely 
difficult  to  present  a  very  conclusive  inductive  argument 
in  support  of  their  theories,  owing  to  the  absence  of 
facts  from  which  to  approach  the  general  conclusion. 
Accordingly,  the  tendency  shown  by  modern  science — 
both  biology  and  physiology — has  been  to  dismiss  the 
theory  of  the  soul's  existence  as  undemonstrable. 

At  the  same  time  it  must  not  be  imagined  that  no 
attempt  has  been  made  to  adduce  a  sound  and  rational 
argument  based  upon  the  accepted  facts  of  science. 
Thus,  the  relations  existing  between  the  molecular  move- 
ments of  the  brain  and  their  manifestation  in  human 
thoughts  and  feelings  have  been  held  to  be  evidence  of 
the  fallacy  of  the  materialistic  theory.  Professor  James, 
in  Human  Immortality,  attempted  to  "  draw  the  fangs  of 
cerebralistic  materialism "  by  ascribing  to  the  brain  a 
"  transmissive  "  function,  but  many  scientists  have  not 
accepted  his  theory. 

It  cannot  be  too  strongly  insisted  upon  that,  because 
mental  activity  and  molecular  change  always  go  hand 
in  hand,  the  one  is  not  therefore  producGcl  by  the  other. 
It  is  certainly  true  that  for  every  thought  we  think, 
there  is  a  corresponding  change  in  the  brain  substance ; 
but  this  merely  proves  the  coincidence  to  us,  and  does 
nothing  to  solve  the  problem  of  causation.  We  know 
that  there  is  a  definite  activity  of  the  brain  during  all 
thinking  processes,  but  tliat  does  not  tell  us  what  the 
activity  is.  It  is  usually  assumed  that  this  is  a  causa- 
tive function,  but  that  is  merely  an  assumption,  as  a 
matter  of  fact ;  and  Professor  William  James  and  other 
writers  have  shown  us,  and  indeed  insisted  upon  the 
fact,  that  this  function  might  be  other  than  causal  in 
character — it  might  be  coincidental,  or  even  the  result 
of  mental  operations !     In  his  Human  Immortality,  Pro- 


COMMON  ARGUMENTS  FOR  IMMORTALITY     279 

fessor  James  contended  that  this  function  of  the  brain 
might  be  a  transmissive  function  just  as  well  as  a  causal 
one ;  and,  on  that  theory,  consciousness  might  exist  apart 
from  the  brain,  and  merely  function  throiigh  it ;  and  such 
an  interpretation  of  the  facts  would  leave  us  quite  open 
to  believe  anything  we  pleased  regarding  the  possible 
separate  existence  of  consciousness.  At  all  events,  it 
would  appear  that  there  is  no  valid  reason,  physio- 
logically considered,  for  denying  immortality ;  it  is 
merely  a  question  of  interpretation  of  the  observed 
phenomena.  Although  certain  facts  would  seem  to  tell 
in  favour  of  materialism  at  first  glance,  it  will  be  seen 
that  this  alternate  explanation  is  ahvays  open  to  us ; 
and  hence  physiology  is  as  helpless  as  philosophy 
when  it  comes  to  this  question  of  immortality — and 
the  possibility  of  solving  the  problem  on  a  'priori 
grounds. 

In  the  Unseen  Universe,  by  Stewart  and  Tait,  an  effort 
was  made  to  establish  the  existence  of  an  unseen  world 
from  which  this  world  has  come,  and  to  which  it  is 
connected  by  bonds  of  energy.  These  physicists  believe 
that  their  theory  explains  both  the  origin  of  molecules 
and  the  force  which  animates  them.  They  claim  that 
the  idea  that  the  visible  universe  has  the  power  to 
originate  life  is  utterly  contradictory  to  the  facts  of 
observation  and  experiment ;  and  they  assert  that  the 
hypothesis  of  an  eternal  unseen  universe  is  necessary  if 
we  are  to  explain  the  law  of  evolution,  the  conservation 
of  mass  and  energy,  the  law  of  biogenesis  (every  living 
being  presupposing  an  antecedent  life),  the  law  of  con- 
tinuity (there  being  no  break  in  reality,  the  universe 
being  of  a  piece),  and  other  recognised  phenomena  of 
life  in  the  visible  world. 

Louis  Elbe,  who  endeavours  to  explain  existence,  both 
in  this  life  and  in  a  world  to  come,  by  means  of  scientific 


280  DEATH 

facts,  resorts  to  the  etlioric  hypothesis  for  some  of  his 
most  important  arguments.^     He  says : — 

"  Seeing  tliat  the  pliysical  sciences  acquire  paramount  import- 
ance in  our  inquiry,  we  turn  to  them  .  .  .  and  discover  the 
fundamental  law  of  indestructibility  governing  all  the  manifesta- 
tions of  matter  and  mechanical  forces.  We  know  that  we  are 
impotent  to  create  or  to  destroy  the  minutest  material  atom,  and 
we  can  induce  no  new  manifestation  of  energy  without  at  once 
causing  an  equal  quantity  under  another  form  to  disappear.  We 
remarked  that  the  law  of  indestructibility  applied  not  only  to 
matter  and  energy,  but  also  to  all  events  of  the  past,  which  also 
become  indestructible  when  they  have  once  been  recorded  in  the 
vibrations  of  the  ether,  and  we  have  every  reason  to  suppose  that 
the  law  holds  good  of  phenomena  purely  immaterial  in  appear- 
ance. .  .  .  W^e  recognise,  in  fine,  that  nothing  whatsoever  in  the 
universe  can  elude  the  inevitable  operation  of  the  incorruptible 
law  which  eternally  preserves  the  memory  of  the  past ;  and  we 
are  hence  justified  in  concluding  that  the  living,  and  especially 
the  conscious,  forces  must  also  be  amenable  to  the  same  law,  for 
it  can  scarcely  have  determined  to  preserve  the  memory  of  our 
most  insignificant  acts  and  yet  be  unwilling  to  preserve  the  being 
who  is  their  author. - 

"  If  we  then  proceed  to  inquire  into  the  mode  of  action  of  the 
physical  forces,  in  the  hope  of  thence  drawing  some  important 
deductions  concerning  the  nature  of  conscious  force,  the  existence 
of  which  we  are  thus  led  to  surmise,  we  find  that  all  of  them  are 
exercised  through  the  agency  of  a  hypothetical  medium  which  we 
term  the  ether,  for  it  is  to  it  that  we  trace  back  the  most  divergent 
manifestations  of  energy.  According  to  our  conception  the  ether 
effects  the  solidarity  of  all  the  elements  of  this  immense  universe, 
which  it  entirely  pervades ;  it  is  capable  of  transmitting  the  effort, 
almost  immeasurably  great,  by  which  the  planets  are  maintained 
in  their  orbits,  and  at  the  same  time  the  most  minute  of  electric, 
calorific,  or  luminous  actions.    It  produces  with  equal  fidelity  each 

1  FxUure  Life,  p.  370. 

2  For  the  modern  scientific  objection  to  these  theories  see  Mr.  Header's 
Theory  of  Death,  pp.  207-26. 


COMMON  ARGUMENTS  FOR  IMMORTALITY     281 

tremor  of  life,  and  it  is  the  requisite  agent  in  the  production  of  all 
phenomena.  But  the  ether  is  even  more  than  this,  for  we  think 
to  discover  it  to-day  in  the  very  constitution  of  matter.  The 
atom,  despite  its  infinitely  small  dimensions,  appears  to  us  to  be  a 
kind  of  infinite  world,  formed  by  the  union  of  etheric  molecules, 
the  existence  of  which  determines  its  fundamental  properties. 

"  Thus,  in  order  to  explain  the  slightest  material  fact,  we  are 
bound  to  fall  back  upon  the  hypothesis  of  an  ether,  which  hence- 
forth becomes  for  us  the  one  reality,  the  hidden  reason  inspiring 
matter  ;  as  the  ancients  put  it,  '  Mens  agitat  molem.^  Are  we  not, 
therefore,  entitled  to  look  to  ether  for  an  explanation  of  life  itself  ? 
May  we  not  consider  life  as  depending  upon  the  action  of  some 
special  immaterial  aggregate,  perhaps  more  subtile  even  than  the 
ether  ? " 

Convincing  as  such  arguments  may  seem  to  those  to 
whom  they  appeal,  the  critical  mind  is  compelled  to 
admit  that  their  validity  does  not  stand  the  test  of  the 
infallible  rules  to  which  all  such  propositions  must 
logically  submit.  So,  too,  the  analogical  argument 
inevitably  falls  when  exposed  to  the  analysis  of  the 
rules  of  correct  reasoning. 

In  presenting  the  details  of  the  analogical  argument 
in  support  of  a  future  life,  it  is  impossible  to  summarise 
such  speculations  more  briefly  and  completely  than  by 
quoting  from  Alger's  Critical  History  of  the  Doctrine  of  a 
Future  Life  :  -^ — 

"  Man,  holding  his  conscious  being  precious  beyond  all  things, 
and  shrinking  with  pervasive  anxieties  from  the  moment  of 
destined  dissolution,  looks  around  through  the  realms  of  nature, 
with  thoughtful  eye,  in  search  of  parallel  phenomena  further 
developed,  significant  sequels  in  other  creatures'  fates,  whose 
evolution  and  fulfilment  may  haply  throw  light  on  his  own. 
With  eager  vision  and  heart-prompted  imagination,  he  scrutinises 
whatever  appears  related  to  his  object.     Seeing  the  snake  cast  its 

1  Pp.  38,  39. 


282  DEATH 

old  slough  and  glide  forth  renewed,  he  conceives  that  in  death  man 
but  sheds  his  fleshly  exuvias,  while  the  spirit  emerges  regenerate. 
He  beholds  the  beetle  break  from  its  filthy  sepulchre,  and  com- 
mence its  summer  work ;  and  straightway  he  hangs  a  golden 
scarabaeus  in  his  temples  as  an  emblem  of  a  future  life.  After 
vegetation's  wintry  deaths,  hailing  the  returning  spring  that  brings 
resurrection  and  life  to  the  graves  of  the  sod,  he  dreams  of  some 
far-off  spring  of  humanity,  yet  to  come,  when  the  frosts  of  man's 
untoward  doom  shall  relent,  and  all  the  costly  seed  sown  through 
ages  in  the  great  earth- tomb  shall  shoot  up  in  celestial  shapes. 
On  the  moaning  seashore,  weeping  some  dear  friend,  he  perceives, 
now  ascending  in  the  dawn,  the  planet  which  he  lately  saw 
declining  in  the  dusk ;  and  he  is  cheered  by  the  thought  that — 

"  *  So  sinks  the  day-star  in  the  ocean-bed, 
And  yet  anon  repairs  his  drooping  head, 
And  tricks  his  beams,  and  with  new-spangled  ore 
Flames  in  the  forehead  of  the  morning  sky  : 
So  Lycidas  sunk  low,  but  mounted  high.' 

"  Some  traveller  or  poet  tells  him  fabulous  tales  of  a  bird  which, 
grown  aged,  fills  his  nest  with  spices,  and,  spontaneously  burning, 
soars  from  the  aromatic  fire,  rejuvenescent  for  a  thousand  years ; 
and  he  cannot  but  take  the  phoenix  for  a  miraculous  type  of  his 
own  soul  swinging,  free  and  eternal,  from  the  ashes  of  his  corpse. 
Having  watched  the  silkworm,  as  it  wove  its  cocoon  and  lay  down 
in  its  oblong  grave  apparently  dead,  until  at  length  it  struggles 
forth,  glittering  with  rainbow  colours,  a  winged  moth,  endowed 
with  new  faculties,  and  living  a  new  life  in  a  new  sphere,  he  con- 
ceives that  so  the  human  soul  may,  in  the  fulness  of  time, 
disentangle  itself  from  the  imprisoning  meshes  of  this  world  of 
larvae,  a  thing  of  spirit  beauty,  to  sail  through  heavenly  airs ;  and 
henceforth  he  engraves  a  butterfly  on  the  tombstone  in  vivid  pro- 
phecy of  immortality.  Thus  a  moralising  observation  of  natural 
similitudes  teaches  man  to  hope  for  an  existence  beyond  death." 

Butler,  in  the  Analogy,^  presents  a  very  similar  argu- 
ment, assuming  that  because  the  caterpillar  is  transformed 

^  Part  I.  0.  i. 


COMMON  ARGUMENTS  FOR  IMMORTALITY     283 

into  the  butterfly,  and  "  worms  into  flies,"  we  are  to  exist 
hereafter  "  according  to  a  natural  order  or  appoint- 
ment of  the  very  same  kind  with  that  we  have  already 
experienced " ;  but,  like  Alger  and  other  exponents  of 
analogical  reasoning,  he  makes  the  mistake  of  trying 
to  adapt  poetic  figures  of  speech  or  fanciful  comparisons 
to  questions  that  must  be  determined  upon  a  purely 
logical  basis.  To  be  legitimate,  analogical  reasoning 
must  justify  itself  by  its  conformity  to  all  the  conditions 
of  correct  logical  induction.  Thus  the  field  in  which 
analogical  reasoning  may  be  properly  employed  has  very 
decided  limitations.  It  may  be  proper  to  employ  it 
when  dealing  with  matters  which  are  known  to  be 
governed  by  the  same  or  substantially  the  same  laws ; 
but  never  when  instituting  comparisons,  either  between 
subjects  which  are  known  not  to  be  governed  by  the 
same  laws,  or  between  subjects  which  are  not  known  to 
be  governed  by  the  same  laws.  ...  In  all  inductive 
reasoning  there  is  one  proposition  that  is,  or  may  be, 
always  assumed,  namely,  the  constancy  of  nature.  Thus, 
by  the  observation  of  a  series  of  phenomena,  say  the 
rising  and  the  setting  of  the  sun,  we  are  enabled  to 
predict  with  absolute  confidence  that  it  will  on  any 
given  day  in  the  future  rise  in  the  east  and  set  in  the 
west.  Why?  Because  we  have  such  confidence  in  the 
immutability  of  the  laws  of  nature  that  we  may  assume 
that  the  order  of  the  rising  and  the  setting  of  the  sun 
will  never  be  reversed.  It  is  upon  this  assumption  of 
the  constancy  of  nature,  or  rather  upon  the  sublime 
verity  of  this  assumption,  that  all  advancement  in  the 
arts  and  sciences  depends ;  for  if  it  were  not  true,  we 
would  derive  no  certain  information  from  our  experience, 
or  from  our  observation  of  the  phenomena  of  nature. 
If  gravity  operated  one  day  and  on  the  next  refrained 
from  operating,  the  whole  human  race  would  be  instantly 


284  DEATH 

put  to  confusion,  and  lose  faith  in  the  integrity  of  the 
Creator.  Inductive  reasoning,  therefore,  could  have  no 
possible  value  as  a  means  of  interpreting  the  laws  of 
nature  but  for  the  fact  that  we  know  that  nature  is  ever 
constant. 

It  is  interesting  to  note,  in  this  connection,  that 
Professor  S.  P.  Langley  did  not  believe  that  any 
"  LaAvs  of  Nature "  exist  at  all,  as  a  matter  of  fact, 
but  are  merely  mental  conceptions !  Thus  he  believed 
that  Nature  exists,  and  that  her  phenomena  are  uniform, 
and  from  this  uniformity  we  have  constructed  modern 
science,  and  formulated  what  we  choose  to  call  "  the  laws 
of  nature."  But  these  laws  do  not  exist  as  absolute, 
fixed  realities,  as  a  matter  of  fact ;  they  are  merely 
mental  concepts.  At  any  time  new  facts  may  come 
upon  the  scene,  which  will  make  us  alter  our  concep- 
tion of  the  laws  of  nature,  and  extend  them  in  a  fashion 
hitherto  undreamed  of.  And  yet  the  laws  are  not 
really  altered,  in  the  old  sense  of  the  term ;  the  fact 
was  that  no  such  laws  existed  as  we  had  postulated, 
and  constant  readjustment  must  be  made  to  fit  new  facts. 
Professor  Langley  insisted  upon  this  over  and  over  again, 
and  wrote  in  this  connection : — 

"The  immensely  greater  number  of  things  we  know  in  almost 
every  department  of  science  beyond  those  which  were  known 
one  hundred  and  fifty  years  ago  has  had  an  effect  which 
doubtless  could  have  been  anticipated,  but  which  we  may  not 
have  wholly  expected.  (^It  is,  that  the  more  we  know  the  more 
we  recognise  our  ignorance,  and  the  more  we  have  a  sense  of 
the  mystery  of  the  universe  and  the  Hmitations  of  our  know- 
ledge, v.  •  Innumerable  are  the  illusions  of  custom,  but  of  all 
these  perhaps  the  cleverest  is  her  knack  of  persuading  us  that 
the  miraculous,  by  simple  repetition,  ceases  to  be  miraculous. 
.  .  .  Suppose  that  a  century  ago,  in  the  year  1802,  certain 
French  academicians,  believing  like  every  one  else  then  in  the 


COMMON  ARGUMENTS  FOR  IMMORTALITY     285 

'  laws  of  nature,'  were  invited,  in  the  light  of  the  best  scientific 
knowledge  of  the  day,  to  name  the  most  grotesque  and  outrage- 
ous violation  of  them  which  the  human  mind  could  conceive. 
I  may  suppose  them  to  reply,  '  If  a  cartload  of  black  stones 
were  to  tumble  out  of  the  blue  sky  above  us  before  our  eyes  in 
this  very  France,  we  should  call  that  a  violation  of  the  laws  of 
nature,  indeed.'  Yet  the  next  year,  not  one,  but  many  cart- 
loads of  black  stones  did  tumble  out  of  the  blue  sky,  not  in 
some  far-off  land,  but  in  France  itself. 

"  It  is  of  interest  to  ask,  what  became  of  the  '  laws  of  nature ' 
after  such  a  terrible  blow  ?  The  '  laws  of  nature '  were  adjusted, 
and  after  being  enlarged  by  a  little  patching,  so  as  to  take  in 
the  new  fact,  were  found  to  be  just  as  good  as  ever.  So  it  is 
always ;  when  the  miracle  has  happened,  then  and  only  then  it 
becomes  most  clear  that  it  was  no  miracle  at  all,  and  that  no 
'  law  of  nature  '  had  been  broken. 

"  Applying  the  parable  to  ourselves,  then,  how  shall  we  deal 
with  new  facts  which  are  on  trial,  things  perhaps  not  wholly 
demonstrated,  yet  partly  plausible  1  During  the  very  last 
generation  hypnotism  was  such  a  violation  of  natural  law. 
Now  it  is  part  of  it.  What  shall  we  say,  again,  about  telepathy, 
which  seemed  so  absurd  to  most  of  us  a  dozen  years  ago  ?  I  do 
not  say  there  is  such  a  thing  now,  but  I  would  like  to  take  the 
occasion  to  express  my  feeling  that  Sir  William  Crookes,  as 
president  of  the  British  Association,  took  the  right,  as  he  took 
the  courageous  course,  in  speaking  of  it  in  the  terms  he  did. 
.  .  .  Though  nature  be  external  to  ourselves,  the  so-called 
'  laws  of  nature  '  are  from  within — laws  of  our  own  minds — and 
a  simple  product  of  our  human  nature."  ^ 

To  return,  however,  we  see  that  analogical  reasoning 
is  a  form  of  deductive  reasoning,  and  it  depends  for  its 
validity  upon  the  accuracy  of  the  facts  which  it  assumes. 
Thus,  when  it  begins  to  argue  from  one  subject  up  to 
an  entirely  different  subject,  or  attempts  to  make  con- 
ditions existing  in  one  class  of  phenomena  apply  to 
phenomena  that  are  entirely  dissimilar  in  character,  it 

1  Smithsonian  Report,  pp.  545-52. 


286  DEATH 

is  trending  upon  dangerous  ground.  If  the  laAvs  govern- 
ing the  subject-matter  observed  are  not  identical  with 
those  of  the  subject-matter  investigated,  the  analogical 
argument  must  fall  to  the  ground  from  sheer  lack  of 
supporting  facts. 

Professor  Chase,  in  his  Bihliotlieca  Saci^a  article  already 
mentioned,  objects  to  Bishop  Butler's  argument  as  being 
"  less  fortunate  than  any  other  part  of  that  great  work." 
In  particularising,  he  said  :  "  Both  of  the  main  arguments 
employed  by  him  are  no  less  applicable  to  the  lower  animals 
than  to  man,  and  just  as  much  prove  the  immortality 
of  the  living  principle  connected  with  the  minutest 
insect  or  humblest  infusoria  as  of  the  human  soul.  It  is 
not  a  little  remarkable  that  this  fact,  w^hich  in  reality 
converts  the  attempted  proof  into  a  redtictio  ad  absurdum 
of  the  principles  from  which  it  is  drawn,  should  not  have 
awakened  in  the  cautious  mind  of  Butler  a  suspicion  of 
their  soundness,  and  led  him  to  seek  other  means  of 
establishing  the  truth  in  question.  These  he  would  have 
found,  and,  as  we  think,  far  better  suited  to  his  purpose, 
in  the  facts  and  principles  so  ably  and  so  fully  set  forth 
in  his  chapters  on  the  moral  government  of  God,  and 
on  probation  considered  as  a  means  of  discipline  and 
improvement." 

In  addition  to  the  particulars  to  which  Professor 
Chase  objects,  there  are  other  directions  in  w^hich  these 
analogical  arguments  fail  to  meet  the  test  of  criticism. 
For  example,  if  it  had  merely  been  inferred  that  because 
a  silkworm  is  metamorphosed  into  a  butterfly,  other 
larvae  were  destined  to  be  transformed  into  winged 
insects,  there  might  be  a  reasonably  logical  basis  for 
such  an  assumption,  because  the  laws  governing  the  one 
case  might  reasonably  be  assumed  to  be  applicable  to  all 
other  like  cases.  The  laws  governing  man,  and  those 
that   apply   to  the   life   of  insects,   are,   however,  of   an 


COMMON  ARGUMENTS  FOR  IMMORTALITY     287 

entirely  different  class,  and  to  attempt  to  make  the 
mortal  life  of  one  prove  the  immortal  existence  of  the 
other  is  certainly  an  illegitimate  use  of  the  principles  of 
analogy,  especially  in  view  of  the  fact  that  the  changed 
conditions  of  the  life  of  this  insect  do  not  in  any  sense 
present  the  elements  of  immortality,  as  the  insect  dies  after 
its  transformation  is  concluded.  Equally  fallacious  are 
Butler's  arguments  based  upon  the  hatching  of  the  bird 
from  the  egg,  or  the  birth  of  man  from  the  womb.  In 
no  case  do  the  same  physical  laws  act  as  the  governing 
force.  On  the  contrary,  as  several  writers  have  said,  the 
presumptions  from  analogy,  when  they  are  legitimate,  are 
against  rather  than  in  favour  of  the  continued  existence 
of  man  after  death.  If  we  take  Nature  as  an  illustration, 
her  phenomena  would  lead  the  logical  mind  to  assume 
that  death  is  actually  the  end  of  the  process  of  life. 
Even  the  analogical  argument  drawn  from  the  germina- 
tion of  the  seed  fails  as  ignobly  to  apply  in  the  case  of 
continued  existence,  for  the  vegetable  life  that  is  derived 
from  the  seed  that  has  fallen  to  the  ground  and  dis- 
integrated is  in  no  respect  the  same  life  as  that  which 
existed  in  the  plant  from  which  the  seed  was  produced, 
and,  if  the  analogy  applies  to  man  at  all,  it  simply 
bears  out  the  theory  of  the  materialistic  scientists  who 
hold  that  man's  only  immortality  is  in  his  posterity. 
If  we  believed,  like  the  Saracens,  that  the  individual 
soul  is  instantaneously  transferred  to  the  universal 
soul  at  death  there  might  be  some  logical  justification 
for  the  assumption  that  an  analogy  exists  "  between 
the  gathering  of  the  material  of  which  the  body  of 
man  consists  from  the  vast  store  of  matter  in  nature 
and  its  final  restoration  to  that  store,  and  the  emana- 
tion of  the  spirit  of  man  from  the  universal  intellect,  the 
Divinity,   and    its   final  reabsorption."  ^     As   here,    also, 

^  Draper's  Conflict  between  Religion  and  Science. 


288  DEATH 

however,  the  validity  of  this  analogy  depends  upon 
the  assumption  of  the  existence  of  a  soul — and  this 
is  the  very  fact  that  must  be  proved,  not  assumed — 
it  would  fall  far  short  of  meeting  all  the  logical 
requirements  of  science.  In  fact,  no  analogy  can  be 
instituted 

"  Between  the  operations  of  physical  nature  and  those  of  the 
spiritual  realm  .  .  .  unless  it  is  first  clearly  shown  that  the 
laws  of  the  two  worlds  are  identical.  And  as  it  is  manifestly 
impossible  to  know  the  laws  which  prevail  in  the  unseen 
universe,  it  follows  that  reasoning  from  such  analogies  is  not 
only  unsatisfactory  to  the  last  degree,  but,  measured  by  logical 
and  scientific  standards,  it  is,  to  employ  no  harsher  expression, 
positively  nugatory.  It  is  like  trying  to  demonstrate  a  proposi- 
tion in  mathematics  by  citing  a  rule  in  grammar.  Nor  does  it 
avoid  the  objection  to  express  the  analogy  in  the  negative  form, 
which  was  such  a  favourite  of  the  late  Bishop  Butler ;  for  it  is 
the  logical  equivalent  of  saying,  '  There  is  no  presumption  from 
analogy  to  be  found  in  the  rules  of  grammar  against  the 
possibility  of  squaring  the  circle.  Therefore  the  circle  can  be 
squared.'" 

There  are  many  Christians  who  feel  that  it  is  little 
better  than  a  waste  of  time  and  brain  -  matter  to 
endeavour  to  establish  the  fact  of  immortality  when 
this  doctrine  has  been  so  explicitly  taught  in  the  New 
Testament.  It  was  this  analogical  argument  that  Paul 
used  when  (1  Cor.  xv.  14)  he  wrote: — 

"  Now,  if  Christ  be  preached  that  He  rose  from  the  dead,  how 
say  some  among  you  that  there  is  no  resurrection  of  the  dead  ? 

"  But  if  there  be  no  resurrection  of  the  dead,  then  is  Christ  not 
risen,  and  if  Christ  be  not  risen,  then  is  our  preaching  vain,  and 
your  faith  is  also  vain." 

Even  should  we  go  to  the  extent  of  assuming — as 
science  will  not — that  the  New  Testament  narrative  of 
the  resurrection  of  Jesus  is  literally  true,  and  that  every 


COMMON  ARGUMENTS  FOR  IMMORTALITY     289 

doctrine  of  the  Christian  faith  can  be  substantiated  be- 
yond the  shadow  of  doubt,  we  are  still  confronted  by  the 
same  objections,  that  exist  in  every  instance  in  which  the 
argument  from  analogy  is  made  to  apply  to  the  question 
of  immortality.  Thus,  if  the  dogmas  of  orthodox  Christi- 
anity be  true,  and  Christ  the  God  who  was  raised  from 
the  dead,  the  very  fact  of  His  divinity  subjects  Him  to 
the  operation  of  a  different  kind  of  law  from  that  which 
governs  mankind.  Moreover,  if  we  are  to  assume — with 
some  other  sects — that,  while  Christ  was  mere  man,  the 
Father  performed  a  miracle  in  restoring  Him  from  death, 
this  assumption  leaves  us  in  the  same  position  as  before, 
for  what  right  have  we  to  imagine  that  because  a  miracle 
was  performed  in  this  case  the  law  of  nature  is  to  be 
violated  for  every  man  who  dies  ? 

It  will  be  remembered,  of  course,  that  these  objections 
to  the  New  Testament  approval  of  the  doctrine  of  im- 
mortality are  simply  raised  to  show  that  we  must  resort 
to  something  more  evidential  than  mere  prescriptive 
authority  if  we  are  to  prove  the  continuance  of  conscious 
life  to  the  satisfaction  of  science.  As  an  intuitive  argu- 
ment, the  teachings  of  the  various  scriptures  are  of  far 
more  importance  as  showing  the  persistence  of  man's 
belief  in  a  future  life. 

As  has  already  been  shown  in  previous  chapters,  the 
antiquity  of  this  belief  in  eternal  life  is  beyond  question. 
All  races  have  held  it,  and  in  all  ages  it  has  been  the 
star  of  hope  to  which  all  men  have  instinctively  turned. 
Thus,  Alger  says  : — 

"It  is  obvious  that  man  is  endowed  at  once  with  foreknowledge 
of  death  and  with  a  powerful  love  of  life.  It  is  not  a  love  of  being 
here,  for  he  often  loathes  the  scenes  around  him.  It  is  a  love  of 
self-possessed  existence,  a  love  of  his  own  soul  in  its  central  con- 
sciousness and  bounded  reality.  This  is  the  inseparable  element 
of  his  very  entity.     Crowned  with  free-will,  walking  on  the  crest 

T 


290  DEATH 

of  the  world,  enfeoffed  with  individual  faculties,  served  by  vassal 
nature  with  tributes  of  various  joy,  he  cannot  bear  the  thought  of 
losing  himself  or  of  sliding  into  the  general  abyss  of  matter.  His 
interior  consciousness  is  permeated  with  a  self-preserving  instinct, 
and  shudders  at  every  glimpse  of  danger  or  hint  of  death.  The 
soul,  pervaded  with  a  guardian  instinct  of  life  and  seeing  death's 
steady  approach  to  destroy  the  body,  necessitates  the  conception  of 
an  escape  into  another  state  of  existence.  Fancy  and  reason,  thus 
set  at  work,  speedily  construct  a  thousand  theories  filled  with 
details.  Desire  first  fathers  the  thought,  and  then  thought  woos 
belief." 

This  restless  yearning  for  another  world,  a  realm  in 
which  the  disembodied  spirit  may  continue  the  conscious 
existence  that  the  physical  senses  now  know  as  life,  has 
been  at  the  bottom  of  all  religious  faiths ;  but  while  it  is 
possible  that  this  belief  in  immortality  may  be  the  logical 
expression  of  the  immortal  spark  within  us,  this  argument, 
conclusive  though  it  may  be  to  many  persons,  does  not, 
and  will  not,  satisfy  science  until  we  can  demonstrate 
that  it  is  something  more  than  the  material  instinct  of 
self-preservation  which  is  common  to  all  physical  organ- 
isms. Like  the  analogical  argument  presented  by  Alger 
and  Butler,  the  argument  of  intuition  applies  to  the  lower 
animals  quite  as  logically  as  it  does  to  man.  Though 
we  may  look  upon  ourselves  as  of  more  account  in  the 
eye  of  the  Creator,  the  final  product  of  an  evolutionary 
process  to  which  we  are  no  longer  subject,  such  pre- 
sumptions do  not  constitute  a  particularly  valid  argument. 
As  Schopenhauer  says  : — 

"Every  one  feels  that  he  is  something  different  from  a  being 
who  has  once  been  created  from  nothing  by  another  being.  In 
this  way  the  assurance  rises  within  him  that  although  death  can 
make  an  end  of  his  life,  it  cannot  make  an  end  of  his  existence."  ^ 

*  Indestructibility  of  our  Nature  by  Death. 


COMMON  ARGUMENTS  FOR  IMMORTALITY     291 

Clearly  as  Schopenhauer  states  this  argument  with 
which  mankind  has  sought  to  establish  a  basis  for  its 
belief  in  immortality,  man  is  too  logical  a  reasoner  not  to 
recognise  the  fact  that  such  a  theory  cannot  be  adapted 
exclusively  to  the  members  of  the  genus  homo.  "  Man  is 
something  else  than  an  animate  nothing,"  he  asserts,  and 
with  this  all  who  believe  in  immortality  will  agree ;  but 
to  this  he  adds,  "  and  the  animal  also." 

In  conclusion,  we  may  say  that,  while  we  are  ready  to 
admit  that  the  presence  of  the  belief  in  eternal  life  in 
almost  every  human  heart  may  be  taken  as  sl  presumption 
that  such  a  desire  may  yet  be  realised,  we  still  deny  that 
such  theories  as  those  we  have  described  can  logically  be 
accepted  as  a  conclusive  argument.  Before  the  doctrine 
of  the  continuance  of  conscious  existence  after  death  can 
be  accepted  as  proved,  we  must  demonstrate  that  another 
world  actually  exists,  and  that  in  this  unseen  realm  the 
disembodied  spirit,  by  whatever  name  we  may  designate 
it,  continues  to  maintain  the  individuality  that  it  possessed 
on  earth.  When  this  result  has  been  attained,  and  not 
until  then,  will  man  be  justified  in  regarding  his  hope  for 
immortality  as  anything  more  than  the  manifestation  of 
that  instinct  of  self-preservation  that  has  ever  been  the 
"  first  law  of  nature." 


PART   III 

PSYCHOLOGICAL 


INTRODUCTORY 

All  things  perish  !  So  far  as  we  can  see,  there  is  not 
one  thing  in  the  universe  which  escapes  that  fate,  unless 
it  be  energy.  Science  has  always  contended  that  every 
individual  organism  must  die ;  that,  no  matter  how  long 
death  may  be  postponed,  it  must  come  sooner  or  later. 
Everything  in  the  universe  perishes,  it  was  said — all 
but  two  things,  matter  and  energy.  But  now  the  newer 
school  of  physicists  contends  that  matter,  too,  perishes, 
and  that  the  old  dogma  of  the  indestructibility  of  matter 
is  erroneous,  and  not  in  accord  with  the  latest  discoveries 
of  modern  science.  Yet,  oddly  enough,  life,  the  most 
precious  of  all  the  energies,  is  supposed  to  become  extinct 
at  death  !  The  energy  we  call  life  is  supposed,  it  is  true, 
to  pass  into  other  modes  of  energy ;  but  it  does  not 
persist  as  such.  The  only  trouble  experienced  by  those 
who  condemned  this  view  and  contended  that  the  mental 
life  did  persist  after  bodily  dissolution  was  that  there  was 
no  evidence  that  it  did  !  In  the  absence  of  this  proof 
the  doctrine  had,  naturally,  to  be  given  up. 

When  consciousness  came  to  be  treated  as  a  function 
of  the  brain,  still  more  doubt  was  thrown  upon  the  belief, 
which  now  seemed  to  have  no  solid  ground  for  its  rational 
support.  On  the  materialistic  theory,  consciousness  was 
considered  a  mere  product  of  the  brain's  functioning — a 
position,  however,  open  to  many  objections,  as  one  of  us 
has  already  shown.^     But  in  the  absence  of  positive  proof 

1  The  Coming  Science,  pp.  114-179  ;  The  Physical  Phenomena  of  Spirit- 
ualism, pp.  413,  414. 

295 


296  DEATH 

to  the  contrary,  there  was  always  a  justification  for  the 
scepticism  that  prevailed,  for  the  most  part,  during  the 
closing  years  of  the  last  century. 

But  now  we  come  to  psychical  phenomena.  Here  are 
facts  which  (apparently  at  least)  prove  that  conscious- 
ness does  persist  apart  from  the  body,  and  evidence  is  pro- 
duced in  support  of  that  belief.  Whether  the  evidence 
is  sufficiently  conclusive  or  not  is,  of  course,  another 
matter ;  but  no  one  can  dispute  the  fact  that  this  is  the 
rational  method — the  right  way  of  solving  the  problem, 
and  the  only  way  in  which  it  can  ever  be  solved.  Argu- 
ments as  to  world-theories  and  metaphysics  might  go  on 
forever ;  but  if  definite  facts  can  be  produced,  indicating 
that  some  consciousness  is  active  (that  consciousness 
having  been  severed  from  its  body  previously),  then  rival 
theories  will  have  to  be  adjusted  to  the  facts,  and  only 
by  such  facts  can  the  question  ever  be  satisfactorily 
settled. 

This,  then,  is  the  method  we  propose  to  adopt  in  our 
investigation  or  inquiry.  All  speculations  will  be  avoided, 
and  we  shall  devote  ourselves  to  a  study  of  the  facts.  If 
these  tend  to  prove  the  survival  of  consciousness,  theories 
will  have  to  be  readjusted  to  conform  to  them. 


CHAPTER   I 

THE  MOMENT  OF   DEATH 

1.  The  Hour  of  Death. 

That  more  deaths  occur  at  some  particular  hour  of  the 
day  or  night  than  at  any  other  time  has  been  more 
than  once  maintained  by  statisticians,  who  have  always 
produced  figures  to  support  their  claims.  The  latest 
essays  in  this  line,  the  investigations  of  Dr.  H.  D.  Marsh, 
of  New  York,  indicate  that  the  wave  of  diurnal  efficiency, 
or  the  range  of  mental  and  physical  activity,  varies  with 
the  habits  of  the  individual  as  regards  work  and  sleep, 
and  that  with  inhabitants  of  civilised  communities  the 
hour  of  greatest  efficiency  is  likely  to  be  5  p.m.  Says 
The  British  Medical  Journal  (London,  January  18,  1910), 
in  an  article  on  this  subject : — 

"  This  conclusion  was  the  outcome  of  a  special  investigation 
conducted  by  Dr.  Marsh,  and  curiously  enough  an  examination 
of  the  records  of  death  in  New  York  City,  likewise  made  by 
him,  showed  that  during  the  period  under  examination  5  p.m. 
was  also  the  hour  at  which  the  majority  of  23,439  deaths  from 
disease  occurred.  It  is  certainly  notable  that  the  period  of 
the  twenty-four  hours  at  which  the  average  man  is  most  alive 
should  be  the  same  as  that  at  which  his  death  is  most  likely 
to  occur,  and  the  apparent  inconsistency  has  led  to  turning 
over  our  own  columns  in  search  of  previous  observations  on 
the  question  of  what  may  be  called  the  hour  of  death.  The 
general  result  is  to  indicate  that  before  any  final  statement 
can  be  made  as  to  the  hour  of  the  twenty-four  at  which  coiteris 

297 


298  DEATH 

paribus  death  is  most  likely  to  occur  in  any  given  individual, 
much  more  extended  and  thorough  investigations  of  the  point 
will  have  to  be  carried  out  than  have  yet  been  undertaken. 
At  present  the  evidence  is  somewhat  conflicting.  Thus  it  is 
found  that  Finlayson,  writing  in  the  Glasgow  Medical  Journal 
and  using  some  statistics  compiled  by  the  City  Chamberlain, 
found  that  of  13,000  deaths  recorded  in  1865,  the  greatest 
number  occurred  between  the  hours  of  5  and  6  a.m.,  while 
Schneider,  writing  in  Virchoios  Archiv  on  deaths  in  Berlin, 
concluded  that  the  most  fatal  hour  was  between  4  a.m.  and 
7  A.M.  The  number  of  deaths  upon  which  he  based  his  con- 
clusions was  57,000  ;  while  Berens,  arguing  from  the  limited 
number  of  1000  deaths  in  Philadelphia,  and  writing  in  the 
Philadelphia  Medical  Times,  concluded  in  favour  of  the  hour 
between  6  a.m.  and  7  a.m.  In  1896  Dr.  C.  F.  Beadles  pub- 
lished the  result  of  an  examination  of  the  statistics  of  Colney 
Hatch  Asylum.  These  showed  a  difference  between  the  two 
sexes  as  regards  the  hour  of  greatest  mortality.  Thus,  among 
1000  women  the  most  fatal  hour  was  between  6  and  7  in 
the  evening,  while  among  3424  men  it  was  between  5  and  6 
in  the  morning." 

Apparently  there  is  a  pretty  wide  choice  here  for 
those  who  prefer  to  die  at  the  popular  hour.  The 
majority,  however,  would  appear  to  lean  toward  the 
earlier  hours  of  the  day,  as  against  the  conclusion  reached 
by  Dr.  Marsh.  None  of  them,  however,  the  writer  in 
The  British  Medical  Journal  reminds  us,  give  counten- 
ance to  the  popular  belief  that  an  invalid  is  most  likely 
to  succumb  at  about  2  a.m.,  when,  according  to  the 
Duke  of  Wellington,  the  heroic  attitude  is  most  difficult 
to  assume.      We  read  in  conclusion  : — 

"  On  the  surface  of  things,  it  seems  unlikely  that  any 
particular  hour  should  be  more  fatal  than  another,  and  in 
any  case  it  is  clear  that  those  who  have  investigated  the 
matter  have  not  always  been  dealing  with  truly  comparable 
units.     Precision  in  recording  the  exact  hour  of  death  is  not 


THE  MOMENT  OF  DEATH  299 

easy  to  obtain,  and,  besides  this,  data  such  as  the  nature 
of  the  illness,  its  duration,  and  the  age  and  sex  of  the. patient, 
have  also  to  be  considered.  The  observers,  as  a  rule,  seem  to 
be  alive  to  this  point." 


2.  Pain  at  the  Moment  of  Death. 

Contrary  to  general  opinion,  there  is  seldom  any  pain 
at  the  moment  of  death.  A  great  deal  of  evidence  could 
be  adduced  in  support  of  this  statement,  but  we  shall  con- 
tent ourselves  with  citing  a  certain  number  of  authorities 
and  a  limited  amount  of  evidence  only.  Dr.  Thomas  D. 
Spencer,  writing  in  the  Popular  Science  Monthly,  some 
years  ago,  said  : — 

**At  birth  the  babe  undergoes  an  ordeal  that,  were  he 
conscious,  would  be  more  trying  than  a  most  painful  death ; 
yet  he  feels  it  not.  Born  in  an  unconscious  state,  the  brain 
incapable  of  receiving  conscious  impressions,  his  entrance  into 
this  hitherto  unknown  world  is  accomplished  during  a  state 
of  oblivion,  known  as  '  Nature's  anaesthesia.'  From  the  earliest 
period  of  history,  death  has  been  considered  as  necessarily  accom- 
panied by  pain  ;  so  general  is  this  belief,  that  the  terms  '  death 
agony,'  'last  struggle,'  'pangs  of  death,'  &c.,  have  been  in 
almost  universal  use  in  every  age  and  under  all  conditions 
of  society. 

"  Nothing  could  be  more  erroneous ;  the  truth  is,  pain  and 
death  seldom  go  together — we  mean  the  last  moments  of 
life.  Of  course,  death  may  be  preceded  by  weeks  or  even 
months  of  extreme  suffering,  as  occurs  during  certain  incurable 
diseases. 

"The  blood  sent  to  the  brain  is  not  only  diminished  in 
quantity,  but  is  laden  with  carbonic-acid  gas,  which,  acting  on 
the  nervous  centres,  produces  a  gradual  benumbing  of  the 
cerebral  ganglia,  thereby  destroying  both  consciousness  and 
sensation.  The  patient  gradually  sinks  into  a  deep  stupor, 
the  lips  become  purple,  the  face  cold  and  livid,  cold  perspiration 


300  DEATH 

(death-damp)  collects  on  the  forehead,  a  film  creeps  over  the 
cornea,  and,  with  or  without  convulsions,  the  dying  man  sinks 
into  his  last  sleep.  As  the  power  of  receiving  conscious 
impressions  is  gone,  the  death  struggle  must  be  automatic. 
.  .  .  Even  in  those  cases  where  the  senses  are  retained  to  the 
last,  the  mind  is  usually  calm  and  collected,  and  the  body  free 
from  pain." 

Professor  Tyndall  stated  that  death  by  lightning 
must  be  quite  painless,  and,  from  an  experience  of 
his  own,  in  which  he  was  shocked  into  insensibility, 
on  one  occasion,  he  should  be  entitled  to  speak  upon 
this  point  with  exceptional  authority  {Fragments  of 
Scie7icc).  Dr.  Edward  Clark,  in  his  book  on  Visions, 
asserted  that  ''  death  is  no  more  painful  than  birth." 
Dr.  James  M.  Peebles  stated  that  in  all  cases  of  death 
from  shock,  there  could  be  no  pain — consciousness 
being  obliterated  too  suddenly.  Henry  Ward  Beecher 
asserted  that  "  there  is  no  pain  at  the  last  moment." 
An  article  in  the  Medical  National  Review,  some  years  ago, 
pointed  out  that  death,  in  cases  where  a  rifle  ball  passes 
through  the  brain,  &c.,  must  be  painless.  Many  other 
cases  and  statements  to  like  effect  could  be  adduced, 
if  it  were  necessary. 

Of  course  there  is  pain  in  a  certain  number  of  cases ; 
of  that  there  can  be  no  doubt.  In  a  few  cases,  notably 
in  those  who  "  fight  for  life,"  self- consciousness,  with  pain, 
is  present,  but  such  cases  are  very  rare.  In  most  cases, 
''  nature's  ana3sthetic  "  is  doubtless  operative. 

Regarding  this  question  of  pain  at  the  moment  of 
death.  Dr.  Osier  has  said : — 

"  I  have  careful  records  of  about  five  hundred  death-beds, 
studied  particularly  with  reference  to  the  modes  of  death 
and  the  sensations  of  the  dying.  The  latter  alone  concern  us 
here.  Ninety  suffered  bodily  pain  or  distress  of  one  sort 
or  another,  eleven   showed  mental   apprehension,    to  positive 


THE  MOMENT  OF  DEATH  301 

terror,  one  expressed  spiritual  exaltation,  one  bitter  remorse. 
The  great  majority  gave  no  sign  one  way  or  the  other;  like 
their  birth,  their  death  was  a  sleep  and  a  forgetting. 


j»  1 


Says  M.  Finot :  ^ — 

"The  pains  which  accompany  death  are  chiefly  imaginary. 
Even  putting  on  one  side  accidental  death  caused  by  the 
breakage  of  nerves,  apoplectic  strokes,  and  diseases  of  the 
heart,  in  which  pain  is  absent,  the  cases  in  which  we  suffer 
at  the  approach  of  death  are  very  rare." 

It  is  a  curious  fact  that  pain  is  generally  lost  when 
nature  "  gives  up  the  fight."  In  cases  of  cancer,  e.g., 
pain  is  experienced  so  long  as  there  is  life  and  activity, 
but  this  pain  almost  invariably  passes  away  a  few  hours 
before  death.  So  long  as  there  is  pain,  some  attempt 
is  being  made  to  repair  the  vital  damages;  but  when 
pain  ceases,  then  nature  has  given  up  the  fight. 

It  is  certainly  a  noteworthy  fact  that  shock  to  the 
nervous  system  or  the  mind  will  induce  a  sort  of  stupor, 
and  render  pain  absent,  for  the  time  being.  Thus,  Dr. 
Livingstone,  the  African  traveller,  relates  that  on  one 
occasion  he  saw  a  lion  which  was  just  in  the  act  of 
springing  upon  him  : — 

"He  was  on  a  little  height.  The  animal  caught  him^  by 
the  shoulder  as  he  sprang,  and  they  both  came  to  the  ground 
together.  Growling  horribly  close  to  his  ear,  he  shook  him 
as  a  terrier  dog  does  a  rat.  The  shock  produced  a  stupor 
similar  to  that  which  seems  to  be  felt  by  the  mouse  after 
the  shake  of  the  cat ;  it  caused  a  sort  of  dreaminess  in  which 
there  was  no  sense  of  pain  nor  feeling  of  terror,  although  he 
was  quite   conscious   of  all  that  was  happening.     It  was  like 


1  Science  and  Immortality :  quoted  by  Dickinson,  Is  Immortality  Desirable  ? 
p.  11. 

2  The  Philosophy  of  Long  Life,  pp.  225-6. 

2  Related  in  the  third  person,  and  re-written  from  dictation. 


302  DEATH 

those  experiences  which  patients  partially  under  the  influence 
of  chloroform  describe — who  see  all  the  operation,  but  feel 
not  the  knife.  He  claims  that  this  condition  was  not  the 
result  of  any  mental  process.  The  shake  annihilated  fear, 
and  allowed  no  sense  of  horror  on  looking  around  at  the 
beast.  Fortunately  he  was  rescued  from  his  perilous  condition 
without  receiving  any  serious  injury." 

But,  while  it  is  generally  asserted  that  the  law  of 
painless  death  is  universal,  unfortunately  it  must  be 
admitted  that  there  are  some  striking  exceptions  to  this 
rule.  Even  very  aged  persons,  who  seem  to  view  the 
approach  of  death  with  calm  serenity,  occasionally  fight 
strenuously  against  it  when  the  moment  of  final  dissolution 
arrives,  just  as  the  convicted  murderer,  who  knows  that 
nothing  can  save  him  from  the  fate  that  is  awaiting  him 
in  the  person  of  the  executioner,  sometimes  struggles  so 
violently  that  the  keepers  find  it  necessary  to  drug  him 
into  a  temporary  state  of  semi-insensibility. 

The  exceptions  to  this  law  that  sometimes  present 
themselves  are  usually  displayed  just  as  conspicuously 
as  the  manifestations  of  the  law;  that  is  to  say,  the 
calmness  and  courage  shown  by  the  dying  are  qualities 
that  often  excite  our  wonder  and  admiration,  and  yet,  as 
a  matter  of  fact,  they  are  generally  held  to  be  the  natural 
result  of  the  benumbing  process  that  Dr.  Livingstone 
and  many  others  have  described ;  but  when  the  will 
to  live  is  sufficiently  strong  to  overcome  the  quieting 
suggestion  of  impending  dissolution,  the  phenomena  of 
death  assume  entirely  different  characteristics.  Under 
these  conditions  death  indeed  becomes  a  fight  for  life, 
and  this  hopeless  contest  with  nature  sometimes  con- 
tinues up  to  the  very  moment  that  the  last  breath  is 
drawn,  to  the  surprise  and  horror  of  those  who  are  pre- 
sent as  witnesses  of  this  unequal  struggle  between  Death 
and  his  victim.     Personally,  we  have  records  of  but  few 


THE  MOMENT  OF  DEATH  303 

cases  of  this  kind,  but  we  have  known  of  a  few.  We 
believe,  however,  that  the  prevailing  theory  is  sub- 
stantially correct,  and  that,  ordinarily,  death  is  compara- 
tively painless. 

It  is  also  a  remarkable  fact  that  in  certain  cases  the 
nearer  the  patient  is  to  the  point  of  death  the  more  in- 
different to  it  does  he  become.  There  are  many  instances 
on  record  in  which  the  patient  has  fought  against  the 
oncoming  of  death  for  many  hours  or  even  days,  but 
shortly  before  death  occurred  assumed  a  placid  and 
peaceful  expression  and  even  attitude  of  mind.  In  some 
cases  this  is  doubtless  due  to  the  accumulation  within 
the  system  of  carbon-dioxide  and  other  toxic  substances, 
which  serve  as  deadeners  to  the  sensitive  nerves,  and 
induce  practical  insensibility.  But  there  are  also  cases 
on  record  in  which  the  mind  has  remained  apparently 
clear  to  the  last,  and  yet  no  aversion  to  death  has  been 
manifested  by  the  patient,  though  he  was  in  terror  of 
it  before.  Examples  of  this  will  be  found  in  the  next 
section. 


304  DEATH 

3.  The  Consciousness  of  Dying. 

"  Sir  Benjamin  Brodie  states  that  lie  has  been  curious  to  watch 
the  state  of  dying  persons,  and  is  satisfied  that  where  an  ordinary 
observer  would  not  for  an  instant  doubt  that  the  individual  is  in  a 
state  of  complete  stupor  the  mind  is  often  very  active  even  at  the 
very  moment  of  death. 

*' Dr.  Bailie  once  said  that  'all  his  observations  of  death-beds 
inclined  him  to  believe  that  nature  intended  that  we  should  go  out 
of  the  world  as  unconscious  as  we  came  into  it.'  *  In  all  my 
experience,'  he  added,  '  I  have  not  seen  one  instance  in  fifty  to 
the  contrary.'  Yet  even  in  such  a  large  experience  the  occurrence 
of  '  one  instance  in  fifty  to  the  contrary '  would  invalidate  the 
assumption  that  such  was  the  law  of  nature  (or  '  nature's  inten- 
tion,' which,  if  it  means  anything,  means  the  same).  The  moment 
in  which  the  spirit  meets  death  is  perhaps  like  the  moment  in 
which  it  is  embraced  by  sleep.  '  It  never,  I  suppose '  (says  Mrs, 
Jameson,  whose  observations  we  quote),  '  happened  to  any  one  to 
be  conscious  of  the  immediate  transition  from  the  waking  to  the 
sleeping  state.'  "  ^ 

A  letter  on  this  subject  is  to  be  found  in  the  Journal  of 
the  (English)  Society  for  Psychical  Research,  June  1898, 
pp.  250—55,  and  we  quote  that  part  of  it  which  bears 
upon  the  problem  before  us : — 

"...  From  the  materialistic  point  of  view  it  would  seem 
difficult,  if  not  impossible,  to  account  for  such  a  phenomenon  (as 
the  consciousness  of  dying).  Thus,  if  materialism  be  true,  death 
must  be  the  extinction  of  consciousness.  It  would  seem  that  it 
must  be  impossible  ever  to  be  conscious  of  dying ;  that  is,  con- 
scious that  consciousness  is  being  extinguished.  Consequently, 
materialism  would  seem  to  make  impossible  the  phenomenon 
which  is  at  least  an  apparent  fact.   .  .  . 

"  I  have  stated  the  a  jiriori  difficulty  in  supposing  the  fact,  and 
this  is  the  circumstance  that  direct  proof  must  be  found  in  the 

^  Mysteries  of  Life,  Death  and  Futurity,  by  Horace  Welby,  p.  147. 


THE  MOMENT  OF  DEATH  305 

experience  of  the  individual  himself  who  is  dying,  and  external 
observers  can  only  conjecture  the  condition  of  consciousness  of  the 
dying.  But  there  is  another  difficulty.  Often  enough  a  person 
fears  that  he  is  dying  when  he  is  not,  and  also  we  often  observe 
cases  where  persons  evidently  near  death  think  that  they  are  dying, 
when,  in  fact,  they  may  survive  hours,  days,  weeks,  or  even  recover 
altogether.  When,  therefore,  we  measure  such  instances  against 
those  which  happen  to  be  connected  with  actual  death,  we  may 
raise  the  question  whether  they  are  not  after  all  merely  inferences 
on  the  part  of  the  decedent,  and  not  immediate  cognitions  of  it. 
Then,  again,  in  favour  of  materialism  and  against  the  hypothetical 
assumption  here  made,  we  have  to  meet  the  allegation  that  we 
can  be  conscious  of  going  to  sleep,  which  on  a  materialistic  theory 
ought  to  be  as  impossible  as  any  alleged  consciousness  of  dying, 
though  the  fact  of  going  to  sleep  is  perfectly  consistent  with 
materialism.  Hence,  if  I  can  be  conscious  of  going  to  sleep,  which 
may  be  only  a  temporary  suspension,  as  death  is  the  permanent 
suspension  of  consciousness,  why,  the  materialist  will  ask,  may  it 
not  be  possible  to  be  conscious  of  dying  1  All  these  facts  throw 
the  burden  of  proof  on  the  anti-materialist." 

The  writer  (Dr.  Hyslop)  attempted  to  meet  these 
arguments  in  several  ways.  First,  he  pointed  out  that 
many  persons  are  never  conscious  of  going  to  sleep.  Yet 
one  might  be  conscious  of  going  to  sleep  without  being 
conscious  of  dying.  But  it  would  appear,  at  all  events, 
that  a  consciousness  cannot  be  aware  of  its  own  suspen- 
sion. It  might  be  aware  of  its  own  withdrawal,  but  not 
its  extinction ;  and  the  obvious  inference  to  be  drawn 
from  this  fact  is  that  consciousness  is  probably  with- 
drawn in  both  cases — sleep  and  death.  This  would 
agree  with  the  traditional  conception  of  the  departure 
of  the  soul  from  the  body.  Certainly  there  seemed  to  be 
a  consciousness,  and  a  distinct  consciousness,  of  dying  in 
the  case  observed  by  him.  And  what  is  significant 
about  the  case  is  that  his  father  (who  was  the  patient 
observed)  afterwards  "  communicated  "  through  Mrs.  Piper, 

u 


306  DEATH 

apparently,  and  confirmed  some  of  these  inferences 
regarding  the  moment  of  death  and  the  consciousness 
of  dying  !  To  be  conscious  of  a  thing  we  must  possess 
a  large  amount  of  consciousness,  and  be  able  to  reason 
clearly ;  and  if  consciousness  were  being  extinguished  at 
that  time  it  would  seem  quite  impossible  for  any  person 
ever  to  be  conscious  of  dying.  The  inability  to  express 
thought  in  motor  action  might  be  present,  but  that  is 
a  very  different  thing  from  an  extinction  of  conscious- 
ness. Sometimes,  indeed,  there  may  be  an  intensely 
active  consciousness,  and  yet  it  may  be  totally  unable 
to  express  itself.  In  paralysis  this  is  often  the  case ; 
and  when  certain  drugs  are  administered  the  body  is 
unable  to  show  any  signs  of  consciousness,  and  yet  all 
the  senses  and  the  mind  are  painfully  active.  It  may 
be  the  same  here.  It  is  probable  that  at  death  there 
is  a  partial  extinction  of  consciousness  owing  to  the 
shock  and  wrench  of  death,  and  in  the  majority  of  cases 
this  would  doubtless  prevent  the  individual  spirit  from 
exhibiting  any  external  signs  of  consciousness  ;  indeed, 
there  was  but  little  there — though  we  must  always  bear 
in  mind  the  great  distinction  between  the  state  of  being 
conscious  and  the  ability  to  express  that  consciousness  in 
motor  action.  This  is  a  distinction  which  is  frequently 
overlooked  by  psychiatrists,  but  it  should  receive  their 
careful  attention.  This  subject  of  the  consciousness  of 
dying  persons  should  certainly  receive  most  careful  atten- 
tion from  all  physicians  and  others  who  have  oppor- 
tunities for  studying  the  dying.^  A  tremendous  mass  of 
valuable  pyschological  information  might  be  gained  in 
this  manner,  and  it  might  throw  light  on  the  human 
spirit,  its  destiny  and  its  potentialities,  that  could  be 
obtained  in  no  other  way. 

^  A  number  of  such  cases  are  to  be  found  in  a  little  book  entitled 
X-Jiays,  by  Gail  Hamilton. 


THE  MOMENT  OF  DEATH  307 

In  one  case  known  to  us,  a  most  interesting  and 
suggestive  phenomenon  took  place.  The  patient,  who 
knew  that  she  was  dying,  was  dictating  her  last  wishes — 
verbally — to  those  about  her.  Within  a  few  minutes  of 
her  death  she  became  too  weak  to  speak,  and  requested 
that  a  pencil  be  placed  in  her  right  hand,  and  a  pad 
of  paper  under  the  point  of  the  pencil,  so  that  she 
might  write  without  hindrance.  Her  hand  then  pro- 
ceeded to  write  out  her  dying  wishes  in  a  perfectly  clear 
handwriting.  The  hand  seemed  to  possess  remarkable 
strength — a  force  of  its  own — the  writing  being  bold 
and  distinct,  and  the  ideas  conveyed  Avere  consistent  and 
logical  to  the  end.  While  this  writing  was  going  on, 
however,  the  patient  completely  lost  control  of  her  body ; 
the  breathing  became  stertorous,  and  she  passed  into  a 
state  of  seeming  unconsciousness.  This  state  grew 
deeper  and  deeper,  until  the  patient  passed  into  a  con- 
dition which  might  have  been  pronounced  "  death."  The 
pulse  and  respiration  ceased,  to  all  appearances ;  the 
temperature  fell ;  a  limpness  of  the  whole  body  ensued ; 
the  face  became  deathly  pale,  and  yet  her  right  hand  and 
arm  continued  to  write  and  write,  and  correct,  and  give 
clear  and  intelligible  messages,  which  could  only  be 
interpreted  as  issuing  from  a  sound  and  alert  conscious- 
ness— in  full  possession  of  all  its  faculties.  Where  this 
intelligence  resided  we  cannot  say,  but  there  can  be  no 
question  as  to  its  actual  existence  during  the  dramatic 
scene.  The  dead,  inert  body  on  the  bed,  the  right  hand 
and  arm  alive,  mobile,  active — writing  out  the  behests  of 
that  consciousness — the  whole  scene  came  as  closely  as 
anything  well  could  to  a  distinct  utilisation  of  a  dead 
body  by  a  living  "  spirit."  It  seems  to  us  to  bridge  the 
gulf  which  separates  normal,  conscious  influence  from 
the  automatic  writing  of  an  entranced  medium. 

We  can,  perhaps,  throw  some  light  on  these  questions 


308  DEATH 

by  considering  the  last  words  of  certain  famous  men  ;  an 
analysis  of  their  words  may  lead  to  some  clue  as  to  the 
nature  of  their  mental  operations  at  such  times.  We 
quote  a  number  of  these,  on  the  authority  of  a  writer  in 
Notes  and  Queries. 

Last  Words  of  Distinguished  Persons. 

John  Quincy  Adams — It  is  the  last  of  earth. 

Addison — See  how  a  Christian  can  die. 

Alexander  II.,  of  Russia  (when  wounded) — Take  me  to  the  palace, 

there  to  die. 
Alexander  III. — This  box  was  presented  to  me  by  the  Emperor  of 

Prussia. 
Archiriiedes   (when    ordered    to  leave  Syracuse) — When     I    have 

finished  this  problem. 
Augustus  Ccesar — Have  I  not  played  the  farce  of  life  well  ? 
Thomas  a  Becket — I  confide  my  soul,  and  the  cause  of  the  Church 

of  God,  to  the  Virgin  Mary,  to    the   patron    saints  of  the 

Church,  and  St.   Denis. 
Th£  Venerable  Bede — Glory  be  to  the  Father,  and  to  the  Son,  and 

to  the 

Beethoven  (deaf) — I  shall  hear. 
/.  Wilkes  Booth — Useless,  useless  ! 
John  Bunyan — Take  me,  for  I  come  to  Thee. 
Robert  Burns — Don't  let  the  awkward  squad  fire  over  my  grave. 
Byron — I  must  sleep  now. 
Julius  CsRsar — Et  tu,  Brute  ! 

Charlemagne — Lord,  into  Thy  hands  I  commend  my  spirit. 
Charles  I. — Remember  ! 
Charles  II. — Don't  let  poor  Nell  starve. 
Cicero — Strike ! 

Columbus — Lord,  into  Thy  hands  I  commend  my  spirit. 
Copernicus — Now,  O  Lord,  set  free  Thy  servant. 
Queen  Elizabeth — All  my  possessions  for  a  moment  of  time  ! 
Erasmus — Domine  domine,  fac  finem,  fac  finem. 
George  IV. — Watty,  what  is  this  1   It  is  death,  my  boy ;  they  have 
deceived  me ! 


THE  MOMENT  OF  DEATH  309 

GoetTie — Light — more  light ! 

Lady  Jane  Grey — Lord,  into  Thy  hands  I  commit  my  spirit. 

King  Gustavus  Adoljphus — My  God  ! 

Hannibal — Let  me  now  relieve  the  Romans  of  their  fears. 

Haydn — God  preserve  the  Emperor. 

Hazlitt — I  have  led  a  happy  life. 

Henry  VI 11. — Monks,  monks,  monks  ! 

Alexander  von  Humboldt — How  grand  these  rays ;  they  seem  to 

beacon  earth  to  heaven. 
Eobert  E.  Lee — Have  A.  P.  Hill  sent  for. 

Dr.  David  Livingstone — I  am  cold  ;  put  more  grass  on  the  hut. 
Mirabeau — Surround  me  with  perfumes  and  the  flowers  of  spring ; 

dress   my  hair  with  care,  and   let  me    fall  asleep  amid  the 

sound  of  delicious  music. 
Mohammed — Lord,  pardon  me  and  place  me  among  those  whom 

Thou  hast  raised  to  grace  and  favour. 
Mozart — Let  me  hear  once  more  those  notes  so  long  my  solace  and 

my  delight. 
Napoleon  Bonaparte — Mon    dieu  !     La    nation    fran9aise !      Tete 

d'armee ! 
Thomas  Paine  (to  Dr.  Manley,  who  asked  him,  "  Do  you  wish  to 

believe  that  Jesus  was  the  son  of  God?") — I  have  no  wish 

to  believe  on  the  subject, 
SiGedenborg — What  o'clock  is  it?      (He  was   told.)      It  is  well  ; 

thank  you,  and  God  bless  you. 
Washington — It  is  well. 
Daniel  Webster — I  still  live  ! 

William  the  Conqueror — I  commend  my  soul  to  Mary. 
Rabelais — Ring  down  the  curtain  ;  the  farce  is  over  ! 
Sir    Walter  Raleigh  (to  the    executioner) — Why  dost    thou   not 

strike  ?     Strike,  man  ! 

Comparatively  few  of  the  ejaculations  quoted,  un- 
fortunately, afford  any  clue  to  our  problem.  The 
majority  of  these  "  last  words " — even  if  authentic — 
were  spoken  before  falling  asleep,  apparently,  in  which 
sleep  they  died,  or  were   too   exhausted  to  speak  upon 


310  DEATH 

awakening.  Such  "  last  words,"  therefore,  are  of  Kttle 
use.  Nor  can  those  of  Charles  I.,  Cicero,  &c.,  be  con- 
sidered, since  these  men  were  in  full  possession  of  their 
faculties  when  they  spoke.  A  few  of  the  other  sentences 
were  apparently  spoken  in  delirium,  and  we  should  have 
to  disregard  these  also.  A  few  of  interest  remain.  The 
dying  words  of  Goethe,  Alexander  von  Humboldt,  and 
Daniel  Webster  are  perhaps  the  only  ones  that  could  be 
cited  as  bearing  directly  on  this  question ;  but  their 
words  have  peculiar  significance.  It  would  be  useless 
to  speak  of  Goethe's  words.  More  has  been  written  about 
those  famous  words  already  than  many  persons  read  in  a 
lifetime  !  But  Webster's  remark,  "  I  still  live,"  and  Hum- 
boldt's apparent  attempt  to  describe  what  he  was  seeing, 
would  indicate  that  an  intelligence  was  active  in  both 
these  cases,  and  that  remarkable  things  were  happening 
to  the  mental  man  which  they  were  endeavouring  to 
describe.  These  last  words  of  dying  persons  should  be 
recorded  with  the  utmost  care,  and  all  those  who  see 
much  of  death-beds  should  make  it  their  duty  faithfully 
to  record  all  such  utterances — as  possibly  bearing  on  this 
question  of  the  consciousness  of  dying,  and  even  on  the 
far  greater  question  of  the  immortality  of  the  soul. 

Another  fact  of  great  interest  in  this  connection,  and 
bearing  more  or  less  directly  on  the  problem,  is  the 
question  of  sensations  (mental  operations)  by  those  who 
thought  they  were  dying,  and  were,  as  a  matter  of  fact, 
revived,  after  they  had  lost  consciousness. 

In  connection  with  this  question  of  the  existence  of 
consciousness,  and  of  its  relation  to  the  organism  during 
the  time  of  sleep,  trance,  &c.,  we  desire  briefly  to  refer  to 
the  argument  by  F.  R.  C.  S.  in  his  article,  "  Hora  Mortis 
Nostra},"  in  the  Contcmj^orary  Review  for  August  1905. 
After  emphasising  the  fact  that  there  is  probably  no  pain 
at  the   moment  of  death  in  the  majority  of  cases,  and 


THE  MOMENT  OF  DEATH  311 

quoting  Sir  James  Paget,  who  even  was  inclined  to  the 
opinion  that  if  we  were  conscious  of  death  it  would  be  a 
pleasure — he  states  his  own  opinion — which  is,  that  it 
is  a  condition  involving  neither  pain  nor  pleasure,  but 
is,  on  the  contrary,  a  condition  of  total  unconsciousness. 
In  support  of  this  he  cites  certain  facts,  observed  by 
hiniself,  of  the  effects  of  ansesthetics  upon  patients. 
Here  he  points  out  that  after  the  senses  have  been 
obliterated  one  by  one,  there  probably  comes  a  moment 
when  the  patient  is  conscious  of  but  one  fact  still  left 
standing — that  he  is  he.  At  that  moment,  if  he  be  of  a 
logical  turn  of  mind,  he  may  expect  that  he  will  now 
get  behind  the  veil,  see  things  as  they  are  in  themselves, 
contemplate  pure  Being,  stand  before  the  merum  ens  of 
his  philosophy — and  then  somebody  says,  ''  He'll  be  all 
right  now ;  it's  a  good  thing  that  he  had  it  done  " ;  and 
behold  he  is  back  in  bed  sick  and  sore,  and  drunk,  pain- 
fully sorting  unpleasant  phenomena,  and  as  far  as  ever 
from  pure  Being  !  ^ 

The  writer  turns  to  what  he  conceives  to  be  the 
likeness  between  ansesthesia  and  death.  He  asks  if  we 
can  find  any  clue  to  the  nature  of  death  in  such  states, 
and  he  is  inclined  to  think  that  we  can.  His  conclusion 
is  in  favour  of  materialism,  as  against  the  possible  per- 
sistence of  consciousness  after  death.  He  insists  that 
these  phenomena  conclusively  prove  that  no  such  thing 
as  a  soul-entity  existing  apart  from  the  body  is  possible. 
He  says : — 

"  To  the  notion  of  the  soul  as  an  invisible  personage,  made,  and 
put  into  the  body  at  birth,  and  extracted  from  it  at  the  end  of 
life,  they  [these  facts]  are  utterly  opposed.  The  anaesthetised 
body  contains  nothing  save  that  which  is  bodily ;  no  spark  or 
vestige  of  consciousness ;  there  it  lies,  still  working,  but  without 
an  occupant ;  just  pumping  the  blood  through  the  vessels,  and 
maintaining  the  physical  interchanges  of  the  tissues ;   and  if  the 


312  DEATH 

loss  of  consciousness  be  due,  not  to  an  anaesthetic,  but  to  injury,  or 
disease  of  the  brain,  it  may  last  an  interminable  time.  Here,  in 
these  cases,  is  the  best  object  lesson  in  materialism  ever  given  to 
the  world.  .  .  .  No  amount  of  corpses  can  advance  materialism, 
but  to  watch  day  after  day  a  case  of  profound  unconsciousness, 
the  body  a  mere  log,  fed  through  a  tube,  fouling  the  bed,  a 
physiological  machine,  a  thing  with  no  more  thought  in  it  than  a 
dummy  figure,  and  to  see  men  and  women  brought  to  a  like  state 
in  a  few  minutes  by  chloroform  or  ether,  and  kept  there,  just  as 
part  of  the  day's  work ;  and  to  see  the  process  reversed,  and  the 
lost  owner  of  the  body  spirited  back  into  it  by  an  operation  on  his 
brain — here  are  the  arguments  ready  made  for  materialism  to  be 
used  with  effect." 

The  writer  sees  no  way  out  of  this  difficulty,  since,  as 
he  said,  if  the  mind  was  still  there,  in  the  anaesthetised 
body,  with  consciousness  suspended,  what  is  this  mind, 
and  where  ?     To  these  questions  he  can  find  no  answer. 

Now  it  seems  to  us  that  a  solution  of  these  facts  may 
be  found,  were  we  to  conceive  the  relation  of  conscious- 
ness to  organism  from  a  different  point  of  view  than  is 
afforded  by  present-day  physiology,  and  the  current  pro- 
duction theory  of  consciousness.  If  the  brain  were  the 
actual  producer  of  consciousness,  as  is  taught,  of  course 
its  annihilation  would  be  the  only  rational  conclusion  at 
which  to  arrive  from  these  facts ;  but  there  is  another 
way  of  viewing  and  interpreting  these  same  phenomena. 
Consciousness  might  exist  apart  from  the  body,  be  en 
ra'pport  with  it,  and  merely  manifest  through  it.  On  that 
theory  the  brain  and  nervous  system,  and  even  the  body  as 
a  whole,  would  act  merely  as  its  transmitter,  or  vehicle  for 
expression,  and  the  paralysing  of  any  centre  in  the  brain 
by  means  of  drugs,  chemicals,  &c.,  would  mean  simply 
that  we  have  rendered  impossible  the  motor  expression 
of  consciousness;  we  have  rendered  its  manifestation 
to    our    sense    perception    impossible,   but  we    have    by 


THE  MOMENT  OF  DEATH  313 

no  means  proved  that  we  have  annihilated  conscious- 
ness. We  could  take  the  same  facts,  and  merely  inter- 
pret them  in  a  different  manner.  The  conclusion  which 
the  author  has  drawn  is  therefore  unwarrantable,  and  all 
his  facts  might  be  just  as  readily  explained  on  the  theory 
of  an  external  consciousness  or  soul,  which  is  active  at  the 
time  elsewhere,  and  which  persists  after  the  death  of 
the  body. 

Let  us  illustrate  this  fact : — 

Dr.  Stephens  {Natural  Salvation,^^.  179—80)  says: — 

"  What  happens  at  death  ? 

"  First,  the  interlacing  neurons  let  go  their  hold  on  each 
other,  and  self-consciousness  of  the  person  vanishes.  It  goes  out, 
as  flame  vanishes  when  atoms  of  carbon  and  oxygen  no  longer 
combine. 

"What  next ■? 

"  The  heart  no  longer  propels  the  life-tide  of  refined  food  in 
the  blood  to  the  brain — as  in  sleep — and  after  a  few  minutes 
the  neurons  themselves  die  from  suffocation  and  starvation. 
All  those  thousands  of  little  individual  lives  vanish,  as  did  the 
larger  self -consciousness  of  the  person;  for  in  each  the  con- 
stituent bond  of  living  molecules,  atoms,  and  ions  is  disrupted. 

"What  next? 

"  The  dissipation  of  the  brain  as  cadaver  is  a  somewhat 
slower,  more  homogeneous  process,  involving  invasions  of  bac- 
teria, disintegration,  and  reduction  to  more  stable  compounds, 
but  tending  ultimately  to  a  return  from  the  highly  complex 
living  substance,  with  all  its  maze  of  organisation,  to  the 
abysmal  base  of  the  primeval  ions  and  their  lowly  endowment 
of  life-potential." 

Here,  it  will  be  seen,  we  have  as  the  first  and  most 
important  condition  the  abolition  of  self-consciousness. 
It  is  considered  the  sine  qua  non.  Yet  we  have  seen 
that  in  many  cases  this  self-consciousness  is  not  abo- 
lished   in   the   manner   supposed  at  all ;   but  that  it   is 


314  DEATH 

conscious  and  aware  of  all  that  is  going  on.  As  we  have 
argued,  this  does  not  look  in  the  least  like  extinction, 
but  rather  transition.  And  again,  it  would  be  most 
difficult  to  account  for  many  of  those  cases  in  which 
the  subject  had  dropped  dead  instanter.  Are  we  to 
suppose  that  the  interlacing  neurons  let  go  their  hold 
on  each  other  all  at  once  ?  Or  would  it  not  rather 
appear  to  be  an  instantaneous  process  complete  in  itself, 
and  that  this  "  letting  go  "  phenomenon  was  merely  one 
of  the  many  physiological  processes  that  resulted  from 
death,  rather  than  the  one  that  caused  it  ?  We  must 
be  most  careful  to  distinguish  between  cause  and  effect 
here.  Does  consciousness  cease  because  the  neurons  no 
longer  function ;  or  do  the  neurons  cease  to  function 
because  consciousness  is  no  longer  present  ?  Of  course 
that  is  always  a  ground  for  debate,  and  is  a  question 
that  has  not  yet  been  settled — opposite  schools  taking 
opposite  views — and  although  we  cannot  claim  that  the 
facts  tell  in  favour  of  our  theory,  yet  we  must  insist 
that  they  do  not  tell  in  favour  of  the  opposing  theory 
either.  The  question  remains  an  open  one,  and  must 
be  settled  by  other  methods  entirely. 

In  Part  I.  we  made  mention  of  certain  cases,  when  dis- 
cussing the  question  of  drowning,  in  which  remarkable 
flashes  of  memory  are  reported.  There  are  a  few  cases 
on  record  in  which  similar  mental  flashes  have  been 
observed  by  persons  falling  great  distances,  and  it  is 
probable  that  we  should  have  a  large  number  of  such 
examples  if  more  people  who  had  fallen  great  distances 
lived  to  tell  the  tale.  The  following  instances,  however, 
cannot  fail  to  be  of  interest  in  this  connection. 


THE  MOMENT  OF  DEATH  315 

4.  Sensations  while  Falling. 

The  following  is  a  typical  example  of  a  case  of  this 
character.  The  psychological  interest  is  remarkable. 
It  runs,  in  part,  as  follows  : — 

"  Although  I  fell  backward  from  a  tremendous  height,  I 
experienced  none  of  the  anxiety  which  occasionally  attacks  us 
in  dreams  at  supposed  falling  accidents ;  on  the  contrary,  I 
felt  as  if  I  were  carried  doAvnwards  slowly  on  giant  wings  that 
protected  me  against  collision.  During  the  whole  time  of  this 
fall,  consciousness  never  left  me.  Without  feeling  the  least 
bit  embarrassed  or  frightened,  I  reviewed  my  situation  and  the 
future  of  my  family ;  and  the  various  features  of  my  own  life 
passed  before  me  with  unequalled  rapidity.  I  have  heard  people 
say  that,  in  falling  a  great  distance,  one  loses  his  breath  ;  I  never 
lost  my  breath,  and  when  my  body  finally  bounded  against  the 
rocks  at  the  foot  of  the  glacier,  I  became  unconscious  without 
experiencing  any  pain  whatever.  I  felt  nothing  of  the  many 
wounds  on  head  or  limbs  received  during  my  journey  down  the 
precipice  from  coming  in  contact  with  rocks  and  masses  of  ice. 
The  moments  when  I  stood  at  the  brink  of  a  future  life  were 
the  happiest  I  ever  experienced.  I  remember  reading  the 
provisions  of  my  life  insurance  policy  with  my  mind's  eye  : 
the  big  sum  of  money  which  death  was  bound  to  bring  to  my 
loved  ones  I  saw  before  me  counted  out  on  a  green  table-cloth, 
all  in  crisp  bills  and  shining  gold." 

Dr.  Heim  gives  the  following  description  of  his  fall 
down  a  mountain  side,  which  he  fully  expected  would 
end  in  certain  death  : — 

"  Quick  as  the  wind  I  flew  against  the  rocks  to  my  left, 
rebounded,  and  was  thrown  upon  my  back,  head  downward.  Sud- 
denly I  felt  myself  carried  through  the  air  for  at  least  a  hundred 
feet,  to  finally  land  against  a  high  snow  wall.  At  the  instant 
I  fell,  it  became  evident  to  me  that  I  was  to  be  thrown  against 
the  rock,  and  I  did  my  utmost  to  avoid  that  calamity  by  digging 


316  DEATH 

with  my  fingers  in  the  snow  and  tearing  the  tips  of  them  hor- 
ribly without  knowing  it.  I  heard  distinctly  the  dull  noise 
produced  when  my  head  and  back  struck  against  the  different 
corners  of  the  rock ;  I  also  heard  the  sound  it  gave  when  my 
body  bounded  against  the  snow  wall,  but  in  all  this  I  felt  no 
pain  ;  pain  only  manifested  itself  at  the  end  of  an  hour  or  so  " 
{Encyclopedia  of  Death,  vol.  ii.,  pp.  384-5). 


5.  Memory  at  the  Moment  of  Death. 

Those  apparently  supernormal  flashes  of  memory  and 
conscious  activity  at  the  moment  of  death  are  of  very 
great  interest  from  many  points  of  view.  If  memory 
be  a  purely  physiological  process,  as  materialistic  psycho- 
logy would  have  us  believe,  how  comes  it  that  such 
instantaneous  and  vast  recallings  are  possible — at  a  time, 
too,  when  the  brain  is  supposed  to  be  in  a  lessened  con- 
dition of  activity  ?  It  is  not  that  the  brain  is  preter- 
naturally  stimulated  at  such  times,  precisely  the  reverse ; 
it  is  practically  inert  and  unresponsive  to  external  stimuli ; 
and,  one  would  think,  would  be  in  no  condition  to  think 
and  remember  normally,  far  less  recall  such  immense 
numbers  of  facts  in  so  short  a  period  of  time.  And  not 
only  is  the  time  remarkably  brief  on  such  occasions, 
but  facts  are  often  recalled  which  had  entirely  passed 
out  of  the  conscious  mind,  and  would  never  have  been 
remembered  in  the  normal  course  of  the  conscious  life. 
It  would  almost  seem  that  nothing  is  forgotten — a  state- 
ment which  agrees  with  De  Quincey's  estimate  of  the 
case.     In  his  Opium-Eater,  he  says : — 

"  Of  this,  at  least,  I  feel  assured,  that  there  is  no  such  thing 
as  forgetting  possible  to  the  mind;  a  thousand  incidents  may  and 
will  interpose  a  veil  between  our  present  consciousness  and  the 
secret  inscriptions  of  the  mind  ;  accidents  of  the  same  sort  will 
also  rend  away  this  veil ;  but  alike,  whether  veiled  or  unveiled, 


THE  MOMENT  OF  DEATH  317 

the  inscription  remains  for  ever,  just  as  the  stars  seem  to  with- 
draw before  the  common  light  of  day,  whereas,  in  fact,  we  all 
know  that  it  is  the  light  which  is  drawn  over  them  as  a  veil, 
and  that  they  are  waiting  to  be  revealed  when  the  obscuring 
daylight  shall  have  withdrawn." 

Similarly,  the  author  of  the  Hasheesh  Eater  says : — 

"  De  Quincey's  comparison  of  it  to  the  palimpsest  manuscripts, 
while  it  is  one  of  the  most  powerful  that  even  that  great  genius 
could  have  conceived,  is  not  at  all  too  much  so  to  express 
the  truth.  We  pass,  in  dreamy  musing,  through  a  grassy 
field ;  a  blade  of  the  tender  herbage  brushes  against  the  foot ; 
its  impression  hardly  comes  into  consciousness  ;  on  earth,  it 
is  never  remembered  again.  But  not  even  that  slight  sensation 
is  utterly  lost.  The  pressure  of  the  body  dulls  the  soul  to  its 
perception ;  other  external  experiences  supplant  it,  but  when 
the  time  of  the  final  awakening  comes,  the  resurrection  of 
the  soul  from  its  charnel  of  the  body,  the  analytic  finger  of 
inevitable  light  shall  search  out  that  old  impression,  and  to  the 
spiritual  eye,  no  deep-graven  record  of  its  earthly  triumphs 
shall  be  clearer  !  " 

Surely  this  closely  resembles  the  "  Book  of  Judgment " 
of  theology  ! 


CHARTER   II 

VISIONS  OF  THE  DYING 

Only  very  rarely  have  "  visions  of  the  dying "  been 
mentioned  in  the  literature  either  of  psychology  or  of 
physiology.  The  only  extended  discussion  of  them  that 
we  have  been  enabled  to  find  is  contained  in  a  book  by 
Dr.  Edward  H.  Clarke,  entitled,  Visions  :  A  Study  of  False 
Sight.  After  giving  a  resume  of  all  that  was  known  at 
that  time  of  this  subject,  the  author  devoted  some  twenty 
pages  to  visions  of  the  dying.  He  pointed  out  the  fact 
that  automatic  activities  of  the  brain  and  of  vitality  may 
take  place  without  any  conscious  knowledge  on  the  part 
of  the  patient,  who  might  be  completely  unconscious. 
Cerebral  excitement,  congestion,  and  the  abnormal  con- 
ditions that  might  be  supposed  to  surround  the  moment 
of  death,  would  account  for  many  of  these  hallucinations ; 
memory  pictures  and  images  would  come  before  the  mind, 
elaborated  and  dramatised  by  the  dream-consciousness 
of  the  patient.  In  this  manner,  we  are  told,  are  these 
visions  to  be  accounted  for.  And  this  is  the  belief  of 
practically  every  physician  to-day.  They  see  in  these 
states  and  visions  nothing  but  the  activities  of  a  dis- 
ordered and  feverish  imao^ination.  And  vet,  one  cannot 
study  such  facts  for  long  before  he  becomes  convinced 
that  there  is  often  something  not  accounted  for  in 
at  least  some  of  the  instances.  Even  Dr.  Clarke,  who 
started  out  very  dogmatically  to  "  shatter  the  hopes  "  of 

318 


VISIONS  OF  THE  DYING  319 

his  readers,  ended  up  this  section  of  his  work  very  humbly 
by  saying : — 

*'  In  Correggio's  '  Notte  '  the  light  which  illumines  the  group 
round  this  infant  Jesus  proceeds  from  the  face  of  the  Christ 
child,  who,  reposing  on  His  mother's  lap,  unconsciously  baptizes 
all  with  heavenly  beauty.  Such  should,  and  such  must,  be  the 
ineffable  expression  of  transfigured  humanity  upon  the  features 
of  whoever  gets  a  sight  of  heaven  before  he  has  left  the  earth. 
If  ever  a  scene  like  this  occurs,  who  will  dare  say  that  the 
explanation  of  it  may  not  come  from  a  height  inaccessible  to  our 
imperfect  physiology  ?  "  (p.  279). 

Dr.  Hyslop,  in  an  able  article  in  the  Journal  of  the, 
American  Society  for  Psychical  Research  (January  1907), 
writes  as  follows  : — 


"  Visions  of  the  Dying. 

"The  interest  which  such  phenomena  may  have  for  science 
will  depend  upon  a  variety  of  considerations.  The  first  is  that 
we  shall  be  able  to  attest  their  existence  and  their  nature.  The 
second  is  that  we  shall  have  some  reason  to  believe  that  they 
have  a  selective  character  pertinent  to  their  apparent  sig- 
nificance. The  third  is  that  we  shall  have  some  means  of 
distinguishing  them  from  those  capricious  and  kaleidoscopic 
phenomena  that  are  classifiable  as  ordinary  hallucinations. 
The  fourth  is  that  their  characteristics  shall  suggest  some 
coincidental  incidents  not  referable  to  chance,  and,  at  the  same 
time,  distinguishable  from  others  possibly  due  to  subjective 
causes.  It  will  not  be  an  easy  task  to  conduct  such  an 
investigation,  but  it  is  possible  by  long  efforts  and  per- 
severance to  accumulate  facts  enough  for  some  sort  of  study 
and  analysis.  The  method  of  effecting  this  object  will  be  the 
subject  of  discussion  later  in  this  article.  We  must  first 
describe  the  phenomena  to  which  attention  needs  to  be  called. 

"  The  phenomena  which  I  have  in  mind  are  a  type  of 
apparition.     Whatever  their  explanation,  they  have  one  char- 


320  DEATH 

acteristic  which  distinguishes  them  from  ordinary  deliria. 
They  represent  the  appearance  of  deceased  persons  to  the 
vision,  imagination,  or  other  source  of  sensory  representation, 
of  the  dying  person.  If  we  should  find  that  they  bear 
evidences  in  any  case  of  supernormal  information,  they  would 
become  especially  significant.  But  one  of  the  most  important 
things  to  study  in  them  would  be  their  relation  to  instances  of 
hallucination  under  the  same  circumstances  that  had  no  co- 
incidental value.  That  is,  we  need  to  study  the  statistical 
aspects  which  would  require  a  comparison  of  the  really  or 
apparently  coincidental  cases  with  those  which  are  unmistak- 
ably hallucinatory  and  subjective  in  their  origin.  For  this  a 
large  collection  is  necessary,  and  this  can  be  made  without  any 
presumption  regarding  their  explanation.  I  shall  illustrate  the 
kind  which  are  particularly  interesting  and  suggestive.  They 
are,  as  described  above,  instances  in  which  dying  persons  seem 
to  see  previously  deceased  friends  claiming,  in  certain  cases,  to 
be  present  for  the  purpose  of  aiding  in  the  passage  of  death. 
When  this  claim  of  assistance  in  the  crisis  of  death  is  made, 
it  is  through  mediums,  and  it  is  sometimes  or  generally  made 
when  there  has  been  no  evidence  at  the  death  scene  that  such  a 
presence  was  remarked.  I  shall  give  a  few  illustrations  of  both 
kinds. 

"  The  following  instance  I  received  from  a  correspondent 
whose  testimony  I  have  no  reason  to  question  : — 

"'I  called  this  afternoon  (May  14th,  1906)  upon  a  lady  who 
buried  a  nine-year-old  boy  two  weeks  ago.  The  child  had 
been  operated  upon  for  appendicitis  some  two  or  three  years 
ago,  and  had  had  peritonitis  at  the  same  time.  He  recovered, 
and  was  apparently  quite  well  for  a  time.  Again  he  was  taken 
sick,  and  from  the  first,  the  doctor  thinks,  he  did  not  expect  to 
get  well.  He  was  taken  to  the  hospital  and  operated  upon.  He 
was  perfectly  rational,  recognising  his  parents,  the  doctor,  and 
the  nurse  after  coming  out  from  under  the  influence  of  the 
anaesthetic.  Feeling  that  he  was  going,  he  asked  his  mother  to 
hold  his  hands  until  he  should  be  gone.  He  had,  I  forgot  to 
say,  been  given  strong  stimulants  after  the  operation,  which,  I 
suppose,  made  his  mind  very  active. 


VISIONS  OF  THE  DYING  321 

'^ '  Soon  he  looked  up  and  said  :  Mother,  dear,  don't  you  see 
little  sister  over  there  ? 

"  '  No,  where  is  she  ? 

"  '  Right  over  there.     She  is  looking  at  me. 

"  '  Then  the  mother,  to  pacify  him,  said  she  saw  the  child.  In 
a  few  moments  his  face  lighted  up  full  of  smiles  and  he  said  : — 

" '  There  comes  Mrs.   C [a  lady,  of  whom  he  was  very 

fond,  who  had  died  nearly  two  years  before],  and  she  is  smiling 
just  as  she  used  to.     She  is  smiling  and  wants  me  to  come. 

"  '  In  a  few  moments  : — 

"  '  There  is  Roy  !  I'm  going  to  them.  I  don't  want  to  leave 
you,  but  you'll  come  to  me  soon,  won't  you  ?  Open  the  door  and 
let  them  in.    They  are  waiting  for  me  outside.     And  he  was  gone. 

"  '  No,  I  forgot  to  tell  about  his  grandmother.  I  gathered  the 
impression  that  he  did  not  know  his  maternal  grandmother,  but 
may  be  wrong. 

"  '  As  his  mother  held  his  hands,  he  said  :  How  small  you 
are  growing  !  Are  you  still  holding  my  hands  ?  Grandma  is 
larger  than  you,  isn't  she  ?  There  she  is  !  She  is  larger,  isn't 
she?  Her  hand  is  larger  than  yours.  She  is  holding  one  hand, 
and  her  hand  is  larger  than  yours. 

"  *  Remember  that  the  boy  was  but  nine  years  old.  Did  he 
really  see  spirits  and  recognise  them  1  Or  was  it  the  result 
of  the  highly  sensitive  condition  of  the  brain  caused  by  the 
medicine  1 ' 

'*  The  mother  confirms  this  narrative,  and  inquiry  brings  out 
the  following  facts  : — The  boy  had  never  known  his  grandmother, 
who  had  died  twenty  years  ago.  His  sister  had  died  four  years 
before  his  own  birth.  Roy  is  the  name  of  a  friend  of  the  child, 
and  he  had  died  about  a  year  previously. 

"The  following  case  was  reported  at  first  hand  : — 

"  '  Four  or  five  weeks  before  my  son's  death  Mrs.  S was 

with  me — she  was  my  friend  and  a  psychic — and  a  message  was 
given  me  that  little  Bright  Eyes  (control)  would  be  with  my  son 
who  was  then  ill  with  cancer.  The  night  before  his  death  he  com- 
plained that  there  was  a  little  girl  about  his  bed  and  asked  who 
it  was.     This  was  at  Muskoka,  160  miles  north  of  Toronto.     He 

had  not  known  what  Mrs.  S had  told  me.     Just  before  his 

X 


322  DEATH 

death,  about  five  minutes,  he  roused,  called  his  nurse  for  a 
drink  of  water,  and  said  clearly  :  I  think  they  are  taking  me. 
Afterward,  seeing  the  possible  significance  of  this,  I  wrote  to 

Miss  A and  asked  her  to  see  Mrs.  S and  try  to  find 

why  the  word  tliey  was  used,  underscoring  it  in  the  letter,  as 
I  always  supposed  the  boy's  father  would  be  with  him  at  death. 

Miss  A went  to  see  Mrs.  S ,  and  did  not  mention  the 

letter.     When  I   saw  Mrs.  S more  than  a  week  later  we 

were  having  a  sitting,  and  Guthrie,  my  son,  came  and  told  me 
how  he  died.  He  said  he  was  lying  on  the  bed  and  felt  he  was 
being  lifted  out  of  his  body  and  at  that  point  all  pain  left. 
His  first  impulse  was  to  get  back  into  his  body,  but  he  was 
being  drawn  away.  He  was  taken  up  into  a  cloud  and  he  seemed 
to  be  part  of  it.  His  feeling  was  that  he  was  being  taken  by 
invisible  hands  into  rarefied  air  that  was  so  delightful.  He 
spoke  of  his  freedom  from  pain  and  said  that  he  saw  his  father 
beyond.' 

"We  quote  next  a  well  authenticated  instance  on  the  autho- 
rity of  Dr.  Minot  J.  Savage.  He  records  it  in  his  Psychics:  Facts 
and  Theories.  He  also  told  me  personally  of  the  facts,  and  gave 
me  the  names  and  addresses  of  the  persons  on  whose  authority 
he  tells  the  incidents.  We  are  not  permitted  to  mention  them. 
But  the  story  is  as  follows  : — 

"  In  a  neighbouring  city  were  two  little  girls,  Jennie  and 
Edith,  one  about  eight  years  of  age,  and  the  other  but  a  little 
older.  They  were  schoolmates  and  intimate  friends.  In  June 
1889,  both  were  taken  ill  of  diphtheria.  At  noon  on  Wednesday, 
Jennie  died.  Then  the  parents  of  Edith,  and  her  physician  as 
well,  took  particular  pains  to  keep  from  her  the  fact  that  her 
little  playmate  was  gone.  They  feared  the  effect  of  the  know- 
ledge on  her  own  condition.  To  prove  that  they  succeeded  and 
that  she  did  not  know,  it  may  be  mentioned  that  on  Saturday, 
June  8th,  at  noon,  just  before  she  became  unconscious  of  all 
that  was  passing  about  her,  she  selected  two  of  her  photographs 
to  be  sent  to  Jennie,  and  also  told  her  attendants  to  bid  her 
good-bye. 

"  She  died  at  half-past  six  o'clock  on  the  evening  of  Saturday, 
June  8th.    She  had  roused  and  bidden  her  friends  good-bye,  and 


VISIONS  OF  THE  DYING  323 

was  talking  of  dying,  and  seemed  to  have  no  fear.  She  appeared 
to  see  one  and  another  of  the  friends  she  knew  were  dead.  So 
far  it  was  like  the  common  cases.  But  now  suddenly,  and  with 
every  appearance  of  surprise,  she  turned  to  her  father,  and 
exclaimed,  '  Why,  papa,  I  am  going  to  take  Jennie  with  me ! ' 
Then  she  added,  '  Why,  papa  !  Why,  papa  !  You  did  not  tell 
me  that  Jennie  was  here  ! '  And  immediately  she  reached  out 
her  arms  as  if  in  welcome,  and  said,  '  O  Jennie,  I'm  so  glad  you 
are  here.' 

"As  Dr.  Savage  remarks  in  connection  with  this  story,  it  is 
not  so  easy  to  account  for  this  incident  by  the  ordinary  theory 
of  hallucination.  We  have  to  suppose  a  casual  coincidence  at 
the  same  time,  and  while  we  should  have  to  suppose  this  for 
any  isolated  case  like  the  present  one,  the  multiplication  of 
them,  with  proper  credentials,  would  suggest  some  other  ex- 
planation, whatever  it  might  be. 

"  We  shall  turn  next  to  two  instances  which  are  associated 
with  the  experiments  and  records  of  Mrs.  Piper.  They  both 
represent  the  allegation  of  death-bed  apparitions  and  statements 
through  Mrs.  Piper,  purporting  to  represent  communications 
from  the  deceased,  showing  a  coincidence  with  what  was  other- 
wise known  or  alleged  to  have  taken  place  at  the  crisis  of  death. 
The  records  in  these  cases  are  unusually  good,  having  been 
made  by  Dr.  Richard  Hodgson.  We  quote  his  reports.  The 
first  instance  is  the  experience  of  a  man  who  gives  only  initials 
for  his  name,  but  was  well  known  to  Dr.  Hodgson.  It  occurred 
at  a  sitting  with  Mrs.  Piper. 

'"About  the  end  of  March  of  last  year  (1888)  I  made  her 
(Mrs.  Piper)  a  visit — having  been  in  the  habit  of  doing  so, 
since  early  in  February,  about  once  a  fortnight.  She  told  me 
that  a  death  of  a  near  relative  of  mine  would  occur  in  about  six 
weeks,  from  which  I  should  realise  some  pecuniary  advantages. 
I  naturally  thought  of  my  father,  who  was  in  advanced  years, 
and  whose  description  Mrs.  Piper  had  given  me  very  accurately 
a  week  or  two  previously.  She  had  not  spoken  of  him  as 
my  father,  but  merely  as  a  person  nearly  connected  with  me. 
I  asked  her  at  this  sitting  whether  this  person  was  the  one  who 
would  die,  but  she  declined  to  state  anything  more  clearly  to 


324  DEATH 

me.  My  wife,  to  whom  I  was  then  engaged,  went  to  see  Mrs. 
Piper  a  few  days  afterwards,  and  she  told  her  (my  wife)  that 
my  father  would  die  in  a  few  weeks. 

"  '  About  the  middle  of  May  my  father  died  very  suddenly  in 
London  from  heart  failure,  when  he  was  recovering  from  a  very 
slight  attack  of  bronchitis,  and  the  very  day  that  his  doctor  had 
pronounced  him  out  of  danger.  Previous  to  this  Mrs.  Piper  (as 
Dr.  Phinuit)  had  told  me  that  she  would  endeavour  to  influence 
my  father  about  certain  matters  connected  with  his  will  before 
he  died.  Two  days  after  I  received  the  cable  announcing  his 
death  my  wife  and  I  went  to  see  Mrs.  Piper,  and  she  (Phinuit) 
spoke  of  his  presence,  and  his  sudden  arrival  in  the  spirit  world, 
and  said  that  he  (Dr.  Phinuit)  had  endeavoured  to  persuade  him 
in  these  matters  while  my  father  was  sick.  Dr.  Phinuit  told  me 
the  state  of  the  will,  and  described  the  principal  executor,  and 
said  that  he  (the  executor)  would  make  a  certain  disposition  in 
my  favour,  subject  to  the  consent  of  the  other  two  executors  when 
I  got  to  London,  England.  Three  weeks  afterwards  I  arrived  in 
London  ;  found  the  principal  executor  to  be  the  man  Dr.  Phinuit 
had  described.  The  will  went  materially  as  he  (Dr.  Phinuit)  had 
stated.  The  disposition  was  made  in  my  favour,  and  my  sister, 
who  was  chiefly  at  my  father's  bedside  the  last  three  days  of  his 
life,  told  me  he  had  repeatedly  complained  of  the  presence  of  an 
old  man  at  the  foot  of  his  bed,  who  annoyed  him  by  discussing 
his  private  affairs.' 

"  The  reader  will  remark  that  the  incident  is  associated  with 
a  prediction,  but  it  is  not  the  subject  of  important  observation 
at  present.  The  chief  point  of  interest  is  that  the  prediction  is 
connected  with  a  reference  to  a  will  affecting  private  business 
matters,  that  the  sister  reported  a  number  of  visions  or  appari- 
tions on  the  man's  death-bed,  and  that  subsequent  to  his  death, 
not  known  apparently  to  Mrs.  Piper,  the  statement  was  made 
by  Phinuit  that  he  had  influenced  or  tried  to  persuade  the  man 
in  reference  to  these  matters.  The  coincidence  is  unmistakable, 
and  the  cause  is  suggested  by  the  very  nature  of  the  phenomena 
and  the  conditions  under  which  they  occurred.  But  we  should 
have  a  large  mass  of  such  incidents  to  give  the  hypothesis 
something  like  scientific  proof. 


VISIONS  OF  THE  DYING  325 

"  The  next  case  is  a  most  important  one.  It  is  connected 
with  an  experiment  by  Dr.  Hodgson  with  Mrs.  Piper,  as  was 
the  previous  one,  and  came  out  as  an  accidental  feature  of  the 
sitting.  The  account  is  associated  in  his  report  with  incidents 
quoted  by  him  in  explanation  of  the  difficulty  and  confusion 
accompanying  real  or  alleged  communications  from  the  dead. 
It  will  be  useful  to  quote  the  report  on  that  point  before 
narrating  the  incident  itself  as  the  circumstances  associated 
with  the  facts  are  important  in  the  understanding  of  the  case, 
while  they  also  suggest  a  view  of  the  phenomena  which  may 
explain  the  rarity  of  them. 

"'That  persons  just  deceased,'  says  Dr.  Hodgson,  'should 
be  extremely  confused  and  unable  to  communicate  directly,  or 
even  at  all,  seems  perfectly  natural  after  the  shock  and  wrench 
of  death.  Thus  in  the  case  of  Hart,  he  was  unable  to  write  the 
second  day  after  death.  In  another  case  a  friend  of  mine,  whom 
I  may  call  D.,  wrote,  with  what  appeared  to  be  much  difficulty, 
his  name  and  the  words,  "  I  am  all  right  now.  Adieu,"  within 
two  or  three  days  of  his  death.  In  another  case,  F.,  a  near 
relative  of  Madame  Elisa,  was  unable  to  write  on  the  morning 
after  his  death.  On  the  second  day  after,  when  a  stranger  was 
present  with  me  for  a  sitting,  he  wrote  two  or  three  sentences, 
saying,  "  I  am  too  weak  to  articulate  clearly,"  and  not  many  days 
later  he  wrote  fairly  well  and  clearly,  and  dictated  to  Madame 
Elisa  (deceased),  as  amanuensis,  an  account  of  his  feelings  at 
finding  himself  in  his  new  surroundings.' 

"In  a  footnote  Dr.  Hodgson  adds  an  account  of  what  this 
Madame  Elisa  communicated  regarding  the  man.  We  quote 
this  in  full.  Referring  to  this  F.  and  Madame  Elisa,  he 
says  :— 

"  '  The  notice  of  his  death  was  in  a  Boston  paper,  and  I  hap- 
pened to  see  it  on  my  way  to  the  sitting.  The  first  writing  of  the 
sitting  came  from  Madame  Elisa,  without  my  expecting  it.  She 
wrote  clearly  and  strongly,  explaining  that  F.  was  there  with 
her,  but  unable  to  speak  directly,  that  she  wished  to  give  me  an 
account  of  how  she  had  helped  F.  to  reach  her.  She  said  that 
she  had  been  present  at  his  death-bed,  and  had  spoken  to  him, 
and  she  repeated  what  she  had  said,  an  unusual  form  off  expres- 


326  DEATH 

sion,  and  indicated  that  he  had  heard  and  recognised  her.  This 
was  confirmed  in  detail  in  the  only  way  possible  at  the  time,  by 
a  very  intimate  friend  of  Madame  Elisa  and  myself,  and  also  of 
the  nearest  surviving  relative  of  F.  I  showed  my  friend  the 
account  of  the  sitting,  and  to  this  friend  a  day  or  two  later,  the 
relative,  who  was  present  at  the  death-bed,  stated  spontaneously 
that  F.,  when  dying  said  that  he  saw  Madame  Elisa,  who  was 
speaking  to  him,  and  he  repeated  what  she  was  saying.  The 
expression  so  repeated,  which  the  relative  quoted  to  my  fiiend, 
was  that  which  I  had  received  from  Madame  Elisa  through  Mrs. 
Piper's  trance,  when  the  death-bed  incident  was  of  course  entirely 
unknown  to  me.' " 

The  cases  which  we  have  mentioned  show  interesting 
coincidences  and  are  too  valuable  for  us  to  disregard  the 
opportunity  to  collect  similar  instances  with  a  view  to 
their  study  m  detail.  We  must  expect  the  largest 
number  of  them  to  be  non-evidential — that  is,  to  repre- 
sent facts  which  are  not  verifiable  regarding  "  the 
other  side."  But  if  they  can  be  obtained  in  sufficient 
numbers  to  exclude  chance,  then  we  may  have  a 
scientific  problem.  To  exclude  chance  we  need  to 
compare  them  with  visions  that  do  not  represent  the 
discarnate  as  thus  appearing,  but  that  may  be  treated 
as  casual  hallucinations.  Hence  we  should  want  to 
take  account  of  all  types  of  dying  experiences  as 
observed  by  the  living.  It  will  be  especially  important 
to  have  records  from  those  who  were  thought  to  be 
very  ill  or  dying,  and  recovered,  who  may  describe 
peculiar  experiences  in  conditions  bordering  on  death. 
Our  chief  object  will  have  been  gained,  however,  if  we 
have  shown  that  such  visions  are  not  invariably  pro- 
ducts of  diseased  imaginations,  but  may  sometimes 
represent  glimpses  of  a  reality — of  a  spiritual  world, 
into  which  the  soul  of  the  dying  person  is  apparently 
about  to  enter. 


VISIONS  OF  THE  DYING  327 

In  an  interesting  article  in  the  Annals  of  Psychical 
Science,  Dr.  Bozzano  enumerates  some  twenty-two  cases 
of  this  character,  of  which  the  following  is  one.  It  will 
be  seen  that  apparent  supernormal  information  is  given 
here,  seeming  to  indicate  that  some  unexplained  faculty 
is  operative,  enabling  the  dying  man  to  be  cognisant  of 
facts  normally  unknown  to  him.     The  account  reads : — 

"My  brother,  John  Alkin  Ogle,  died  at  Leeds,  July  17th, 
1879.  About  an  hour  before  he  expired  he  saw  his  brother, 
who  had  died  about  sixteen  years  before,  and  looking  up  with 
fixed  hiterest  said,  '  Joe !  Joe  ! '  and  immediately  after  exclaimed 
with  ardent  surprise,  '  George  Hanley  ! '  My  mother,  who  had 
come  from  Melboiu-ne,  a  distance  of  about  forty  miles,  where 
George  Hanley  resided,  was  astonished  at  this,  and,  turning  to 
my  sister-in-law,  asked  if  anybody  had  told  John  of  George 
Hanley's  death.  She  said,  '  No  one,'  and  my  mother  was  the 
only  person  present  who  was  aware  of  the  fact.  I  was  present 
and  witnessed  this."  (Signed,  Harriet  H.  Ogle.)  In  answer  to 
inquiries,  Miss  Ogle  states:  "J.  A.  Ogle  was  neither  delirious 
nor  unconscious  when  he  uttered  the  words  recorded.  George 
Hanley  was  an  acqviaintance  of  John  A.  Ogle,  not  a  particularly 
familiar  friend.  The  death  of  Hanley  was  not  mentioned  in  his 
hearing." 

It  will  be  seen  that  in  this  case  the  dying  man 
became  conscious  of  the  fact  that  his  friend  had  died, 
but  how  he  came  into  possession  of  that  knowledge,  if 
he  did  not  actually  see  something  corresponding  to  his 
physical  body,  it  would  be  hard  to  say. 


CHAPTER   III 

DEATH   DESCRIBED   FROM  BEYOND  THE  VEIL 

1.  Clairvoyant  Descriptions  of  Death. 

Many  persons  who  possess  that  pecuhar  gift  which,  for  want 
of  a  better  name,  we  term  "  clairvoyance,"  have  been  en- 
abled to  perceive  (apparently)  just  what  takes  place  at 
death,  and  have  described  this  with  great  detail  and  exacti- 
tude. Here,  for  example,  is  a  description  given  by  Andrew 
Jackson  Davis,  in  his  Great  Harmonia,  vol.  i.,  p.  15  7,  &c. : — 

"  When  the  hour  of  her  death  arrived,  I  was  fortunately  in  a 
proper  state  of  mind  and  body  to  induce  the  superior  (clair- 
voyant) condition  ;  but,  previous  to  throwing  my  spirit  into  that 
condition,  I  sought  the  most  convenient  and  favourable  position, 
that  I  might  be  allowed  to  make  the  observations  entirely  un- 
noticed and  undisturbed.  Thus  situated  and  conditioned,  I 
proceeded  to  observe  and  investigate  the  mysterious  process  of 
dying,  and  to  learn  what  it  is  for  an  individual  human  spirit  to 
undergo  the  changes  subsequent  upon  physical  death  or  external 
dissolution.     They  were  these  : — 

"  I  saw  that  the  physical  organism  could  no  longer  subserve 
the  diversified  purposes  or  requirements  of  the  spiritual  prin- 
ciple. But  the  various  internaj  organs  of  the  body  appeared  to 
resist  the  withdrawal  of  the  animating  spirit.  The  body  and  the 
soul,  like  two  friends,  strongly  resisted  the  various  circumstances 
which  rendered  their  external  separation  imperative  and  abso- 
lute. These  internal  conflicts  gave  rise  to  manifestations  of 
what  seemed,  to  the  material  senses,  the  most  thrilling  and 
painful  sensations;  but   I   was  unspeakably  thankful   and   de- 

328 


DEATH  FROM  BEYOND  THE  VEIL        329 

lighted  when  I  perceived  and  realised  the  fact  that  those  physical 
manifestations  were  indications,  not  of  pain  or  unhappiness,  but 
simply  that  the  spirit  was  eternally  dissolving  its  copartnership 
with  the  material  organism. 

"  Now  the  head  of  the  body  became  suddenly  enveloped  in  a 
fine,  soft,  mellow,  luminous  atmosphere  ;  and,  as  instantly,  I  saw 
the  cerebrum  and  the  cerebellum  expand  their  most  interior 
portions;  I  saw  them  discontinue  their  appropriate  galvanic 
functions;  and  then  I  saw  that  they  became  highly  charged 
with  the  vital  electricity  and  vital  magnetism  which  permeate 
subordinate  systems  and  structures.  That  is  to  say,  the  brain, 
as  a  whole,  suddenly  declared  itself  to  be  tenfold  more  positive, 
over  the  lesser  proportions  of  the  body,  than  it  ever  was  during 
the  period  of  health.  This  phenomenon  invariably  precedes 
physical  dissolution. 

"  Now  the  process  of  dying,  or  the  spirit's  departure  from  the 
body,  was  fully  commenced.  The  brain  began  to  attract  the 
elements  of  electricity,  of  magnetism,  of  motion,  of  life,  and  of 
sensation,  into  its  various  and  numerous  departments.  The 
head  became  intensely  brilliant;  and  I  particularly  remarked 
that,  just  in  the  same  proportion  as  the  extremities  of  the 
organism  grew  dark  and  cold,  the  brain  appeared  light  and 
glowing. 

"  Now  I  saw,  in  the  mellow,  spiritual  atmosphere  which 
emanated  from  and  encircled  her  head,  the  indistinct  outlines  of 
the  formation  of  another  head  !  This  new  head  unfolded  more 
and  more  distinctly,  and  so  indescribably  compact  and  intensely 
brilliant  did  it  become,  that  I  could  neither  see  through  it,  nor 
gaze  upon  it  as  steadily  as  I  desired.  While  this  spiritual  head 
was  being  eliminated  and  organised  from  out  of  and  above  the 
material  head,  I  saw  that  the  surrounding  aromal  atmosphere 
which  had  emanated  from  the  material  head  was  in  great  com- 
motion ;  but,  as  the  new  head  became  more  distinct  and  perfect, 
this  brilliant  atmosphere  gradually  disappeared.  This  taught 
me  that  those  aromal  elements,  which  are,  in  the  beginning  of 
the  metamorphosis,  attracted  from  the  system  into  the  brain, 
and  thence  eliminated  in  the  form  of  an  atmosphere,  were  in- 
dissolubly  united    in  accordance  with   the   divine  principle  of 


330  DEATH 

affinity  in  the  universe,  which  pervades  and  destinates  every 
particle  of  matter,  and  developed  the  spiritual  head  which  I 
beheld. 

"  In  the  identical  manner  in  which  the  spiritual  head  was 
eliminated  and  unchangeably  organised,  I  saw,  unfolding  in 
their  natural  progressive  order,  the  harmonious  development  of 
the  neck,  the  shoulders,  the  breast  and  the  entire  spiritual 
organisation.  It  appeared  from  this,  even  to  an  unequivocal 
demonstration,  that  the  innumerable  particles  of  what  might  be 
termed  unparticled  matter,  which  constitute  the  man's  spiritual 
principle,  are  constitutionally  endowed  with  certain  elective 
affinities,  analogous  to  an  immortal  friendship.  The  innate 
tendencies,  which  the  elements  and  essences  of  her  soul  manifest 
by  uniting  and  organising  themselves,  were  the  efficient  and 
imminent  causes  which  unfolded  and  perfected  her  spiritual 
organisation.  The  defects  and  deformities  of  her  physical  body 
were,  in  the  spiritual  body  which  I  saw  thus  developed,  almost 
completely  removed.  In  other  words,  it  seemed  that  those 
hereditary  obstructions  and  influences  were  now  removed,  which 
originally  arrested  the  full  and  proper  development  of  her  physi- 
cal constitution  ;  and,  therefore,  that  her  spiritual  constitution, 
being  elevated  above  those  obstructions,  was  enabled  to  unfold 
and  perfect  itself,  in  accordance  with  the  universal  tendencies 
of  all  created  things. 

"  While  this  spiritual  formation  was  going  on,  which  was 
perfectly  visible  to  my  spiritual  perceptions,  the  material  body 
manifested  to  the  outer  vision  of  observing  individuals  in  the 
room  many  symptoms  of  uneasiness  and  pain  ;  but  the  indica- 
tions were  totally  deceptive ;  they  were  wholly  caused  by  the 
departure  of  the  vital  or  spiritual  forces  from  the  extremities 
and  viscera  into  the  brain,  and  thence  into  the  ascending 
organism. 

"  The  spirit  rose  at  right  angles  over  the  head  or  brain  of  the 
deserted  body.  But  immediately  previous  to  final  dissolution  of 
the  relationship  which  had  for  so  many  years  subsisted  between 
the  two,  spiritual  and  material  bodies,  I  saw — playing  energeti- 
cally between  the  feet  of  tlie  elevated  spiritual  body  and  the 
head  of  the  prostrate  body — a  bright  stream  or  current  of  vital 


DEATH  FROM  BEYOND  THE  VEIL   331 

electricity.  .  .  .  And  here  I  perceived,  what  I  had  never  before 
obtained  a  knowledge  of,  that  a  small  portion  of  this  vital,  elec- 
tric element  returned  to  the  deserted  body  immediately  subse- 
quent to  the  separation  of  the  umbilical  thread ;  and  that  that 
portion  of  this  element  which  passed  back  into  the  earthly  or- 
ganism, instantly  diffused  itself  through  the  entire  structure, 
and  thus  prevented  immediate  decomposition.   .   .  . 

"  As  soon  as  the  spirit,  whose  departing  hour  I  thus  watched, 
was  wholly  disengaged  from  the  tenacious  physical  body,  I 
directed  my  attention  to  the  movements  and  emotions  of  the 
former ;  and  I  saw  her  begin  to  breathe  the  most  interior  or 
spiritual  portions  of  the  surrounding  terrestrial  atmosphere.  .  .  . 
At  first,  it  seemed  with  difiiculty  that  she  could  breathe  the  new 
medium ;  but  in  a  few  seconds  she  inhaled  and  exhaled  the 
spiritual  elements  of  nature  with  the  greatest  possible  ease  and 
delight.  And  now  I  saw  that  she  was  in  possession  of  exterior 
and  physical  proportions,  which  were  identical  in  every  possible 
particular  —  improved  and  beautified  —  with  those  proportions 
which  characterised  her  earthly  organisation.  That  is  to  say, 
she  possessed  a  heart,  a  stomach,  a  liver,  lungs,  &c. — just  as  her 
natural  body  did  previous  to  (not  her,  but)  its,  death.  This  is  a 
wonderful  and  consoling  truth.  But  I  saw  that  the  improve- 
ments which  were  wrought  upon  her  in  her  spiritual  organisation 
were  not  so  particular  and  thorough  as  to  destroy  or  transcend 
her  personality ;  nor  did  they  materially  alter  her  natural 
appearance  or  earthly  characteristics.  So  much  like  her  former 
self  was  she  that,  had  her  friends  beheld  her  as  I  did,  they  cer- 
tainly would  have  exclaimed — as  we  often  do  upon  the  sudden 
return  of  a  long-absent  friend,  who  leaves  us  in  illness  and 
returns  in  health — '  Why,  how  well  you  look !  How  improved 
you  are ! '  Such  was  the  nature — most  beautifying  in  their 
extent — of  the  improvements  that  were  wrought  upon  her. 

**I  saw  her  continue  to  conform  and  accustom  herself  to  the 
new  elements  and  elevating  sensations  which  belong  to  the 
inner  life.  I  did  not  particularly  notice  the  workings  and 
emotions  of  her  newly-awakening  and  fast-unfolding  spirit, 
except  that  I  was  careful  to  remark  her  philosophical  tranquillity 
throughout  the  entire  process,  and   her  non-participation  with 


332  DEATH 

the  different  members  of  her  family  in  their  unrestrained  be- 
wailing of  her  departure  from  the  earth,  to  unfold  in  love  and 
wisdom  throughout  eternal  spheres.  She  understood  at  a  glance 
that  they  could  only  gaze  upon  the  cold  and  lifeless  form  which 
she  had  but  just  deserted ;  and  she  readily  comprehended  the 
fact  that  it  was  owing  to  a  want  of  true  knowledge  upon  their 
part  that  they  thus  vehemently  regretted  her  merely  physical 
death.  ^ 

"  The  period  required  to  accomplish  the  entire  change  which  I 
saw  was  not  far  from  two  and  a  half  hours  ;  but  this  furnished  no 
rule  as  to  the  time  required  for  every  spirit  to  elevate  and  reorga- 
nise itself  above  the  head  of  the  outer  form.  Without  changing 
my  position  of  spiritual  perceptions,  I  continued  to  observe  the 
movements  of  her  new-born  spirit.  As  soon  as  she  became 
accustomed  to  the  new  elements  which  surrounded  her,  she 
descended  from  her  elevated  position,  which  was  immediately 
over  the  body,  by  an  effort  of  the  will-power,  and  directly  passed 
out  of  the  door  of  the  bedroom  in  which  she  was  laid,  in  the 
material  form,  prostrated  with  disease  for  several  weeks.  It 
being  in  a  summer  month  the  doors  were  all  open,  and  her 
egress  from  the  house  was  attended  with  no  obstruction.  I  saw 
her  pass  through  the  adjoining  room,  out  of  the  door,  and  step 
from  the  house  into  the  atmosphere !  I  was  overwhelmed  with 
delight  and  astonishment  when,  for  the  first  time,  I  realised  the 
universal  truth  that  the  spiritual  organisation  can  tread  the 
atmosphere,  which,  while  we  breathe  in  the  coarser  earthly 
form,  is  impossible,  so  much  more  refined  is  man's  spiritual  con- 
stitution. She  walked  in  the  atmosphere  as  easily  and  in  the 
same  manner  as  we  tread  the  earth  and  ascend  an  eminence. 
Immediately  upon  her  emergement  from  the  house  she  was 
joined  by  two  friendly  spirits  from  the  spiritual  country,  and 


^  This  aspect  of  the  case,  this  view  of  death,  is  brought  out  quite  beau- 
tifully by  Mrs.  Mary  F.  Davis  in  her  little  book,  Death,  in  the  Light  of  the 
Harmonial  Philosophy.  One  or  two  sentences  may  serve  as  examples : 
"  When  our  soul  becomes  weary  of  companionship  with  the  body,  then 
does  she  gather  the  frail  form  in  lier  loving  arms  and  lay  it  away  to  rest, 
opening  the  door  meanwhile  for  the  spirit's  ingress  to  the  higher  and 
better  mansions  of  our  Father.  .  .  .  Like  falling  asleep  upon  a  bed  of  sand 
to  awake  in  a  garden  of  roses,  would  be  the  natural  departure  of  the  spirit 
from  earth  "  (pp.  lu,  23). 


DEATH  FROM  BEYOND  THE  VEIL    333 

after  tenderly  recognising  and  communing  with  each  other,  the 
three,  in  the  most  graceful  manner,  began  ascending  obliquely 
through  the  ethereal  envelopment  of  our  globe.  They  walked 
so  naturally  and  so  fraternally  together  that  I  could  scarcely 
realise  the  fact  that  they  trod  the  air — they  seemed  to  be 
walking  upon  the  side  of  a  glorious  but  familiar  mountain.  I 
continued  to  gaze  upon  them  until  the  distance  shut  them  out 
from  my  view ;  whereupon  I  returned  to  my  external  and  ordi- 
nary condition." 

The  same  author,  in  his  later  work,  Death,  and  the  After 
Life,  pp.  15,  16,  thus  further  describes  the  process  of 
dying  :— 

"  Suppose  the  person  is  now  dying.  It  is  to  be  a  rapid  death. 
The  feet  first  grow  cold.  The  clairvoyant  sees  right  over  the 
head  what  may  be  called  a  magnetic  halo — an  ethereal  emana- 
tion, in  appearance  golden,  and  throbbing  as  though  conscious. 
The  body  is  now  cold  up  to  the  knees  and  elbows,  and  the 
emanation  has  ascended  higher  in  the  air.  The  legs  are  cold  to 
the  hips  and  the  arms  to  the  shoulders ;  and  the  emanation, 
though  it  has  not  risen  higher  in  the  room,  is  more  expanded. 
The  death-coldness  steals  over  the  breast  and  around  on  either 
side,  and  the  emanation  has  attained  a  higher  position  nearer 
the  ceiling.  The  person  has  ceased  to  breathe,  the  pulse  is 
still,  and  the  emanation  is  elongated  and  fashioned  in  the  outline 
of  the  human  form.  Beneath,  it  is  connected  with  the  brain. 
The  head  of  the  person  is  internally  throbbing — a  slow,  deep 
throb — not  painful,  but  like  the  beat  of  the  sea.  Hence  the 
thinking  faculties  are  rational  while  nearly  every  part  of  the 
person  is  dead.  Owing  to  the  brain's  momentum,  I  have  seen 
a  dying  person,  even  at  the  last  feeble  pulse-beat,  rouse  impul- 
sively and  rise  up  in  bed  to  converse  with  a  friend ;  but  the 
next  instant  he  was  gone — his  brain  being  the  last  to  yield  up 
the  life  principle. 

"  The  golden  emanation,  which  extends  up  midway  to  the 
ceiling,  is  connected  with  the  brain  by  a  very  fine  life-thread. 
Now  the  body  of  the  emanation  ascends.  Then  appears  some- 
thing white  and  shining,  like  a  human  head ;  next,  in  a  very 


334  DEATH 

few  moments,  a  faint  outline  of  the  face  divine ;  then  the  fair 
neck  and  beautiful  shoulders  ;  then,  in  rapid  succession,  come  all 
parts  of  the  new  body  down  to  the  feet — a  bright,  shining  image, 
a  little  smaller  than  its  physical  body,  but  a  perfect  prototype 
or  reproduction  in  all  except  its  disfigurements.  The  fine  life- 
thread  continues  attached  to  the  old  brain.  The  next  thing  is 
the  withdrawal  of  the  electric  principle.  When  this  thread 
snaps  the  spiritual  body  is  free !  and  prepared  to  accompany  its 
guardians  to  the  Summer-Land.  Yes,  there  is  a  spiritual  body  ; 
it  is  sown  in  dishonour  and  raised  in  brightness." 

2.  Separation  of  Soul  and  Body. 

These  clairvoyant  descriptions  of  the  departure  of  the 
soul  from  the  body  gain  greater  credibility  when  we  take 
into  account  the  fact  that,  even  during  this  life,  certain 
instances  have  occurred  in  which  this  temporary  separa- 
tion has  taken  place ;  the  spirit  has  left  the  body,  seen 
it,  looked  at  it  from  without,  and  travelled  to  great  dis- 
tances and  accurately  seen  what  was  taking  place  there, 
and  returned  to  the  body  at  the  end  of  a  varying  period. 
All  this  time  the  external  intelligence  retained  full  pos- 
session of  its  mental  faculties,  and  remembered  perfectly 
what  was  happening !  Let  us  give  one  or  two  cases  of 
this  character  by  way  of  illustration,  and  these  will  tend 
to  show  that  the  body  and  the  life  principle  are  far  more 
separable,  even  in  this  life,  than  they  are  supposed  to  be, 
or  possibly  could  be,  if  Materialism  were  true.  Here  at 
least  are  the  facts,  which  we  leave  for  the  reader's 
consideration. 

The  Indian  adept  has  always  claimed  the  possession  of 
the  power  to  send  his  "  astral  body  "  to  any  portion  of 
the  world  to  which  he  might  direct  it  to  go.  Science, 
however,  has  been  especially  reluctant  to  accept  such 
tales,  demanding  more  proof  of  the  phenomena  than  has 
ordinarily  been  forthcoming. 


DEATH  FROM  BEYOND  THE  VEIL   335 

On  several  occasions  since  its  organisation,  the  London 
Society  for  Psychical  Research  has  had  its  attention 
drawn  to  cases  of  this  character,  and,  in  every  instance, 
has  investigated  them  as  thoroughly  as  possible.  Some 
of  these  investigations  are  reported  in  Phantasms  of  the 
Living,  and  it  is  from  these  volumes  that  the  following 
facts  are  drawn.  In  the  first  case  the  percipient  was 
the  Rev.  W.  S.  Moses,  and  he  corroborates  the  report,  as 
written  by  the  agent : — 

'*  One  evening  I  resolved  to  appear  to  Z.  at  some  miles'  dis- 
tance. I  did  not  inform  him  beforehand  of  the  intended  experi- 
ment, but  retired  to  rest  shortly  before  midnight  with  my 
thoughts  intently  fixed  on  Z.,  with  whose  rooms  and  surround- 
ings I  was  quite  unacquainted.  I  soon  fell  asleep,  and  awoke 
next  morning  unconscious  of  anything  having  taken  place.  On 
seeing  Z.  a  few  days  afterwards,  I  inquired,  *  Did  anything 
happen  at  your  rooms  on  Saturday  night  ? '  *  Yes,'  replied  he,  '  a 
great  deal  happened.  I  had  been  sitting  over  the  fire  with  M., 
smoking  and  chatting.  About  12.30  he  rose  to  leave,  and  I  let 
him  out  myself.  I  returned  to  the  fire  to  finish  my  pipe,  when 
I  saw  you  sitting  in  the  chair  just  vacated  by  him.  I  looked 
intently  at  you,  and  then  took  up  a  newspaper  to  assure  myself 
that  I  was  not  dreaming ;  but  on  laying  it  down  I  saw  you  still 
there.     While  I  gazed,  without  speaking,  you  faded  away.' " 

The  second  case  quoted  is  also  written  by  the  agent, 
who  is  known  to  the  public  as  "  S.  H.  B."  It  was  con- 
firmed, to  the  satisfaction  of  the  investigators,  by  both 
percipients. 

"On  a  certain  Sunday  evening  in  November  1881,  having 
been  reading  of  the  great  power  which  the  human  will  is  capable 
of  exerting,  I  determined,  with  the  whole  force  of  my  being, 
that  I  would  be  present  in  spirit  in  the  front  bedroom  on  the 
second  floor  of  a  house  situated  at  22  Hogarth  Road,  Kensington, 
in  which  room  slept  two  ladies  of  my  acquaintance,  namely 
Miss  L.  S.  V.  and  Miss  E.  C.  V.,  aged  respectively  twenty-five 


336  DEATH 

and  eleven  years.  I  was  living  at  this  time  at  23  Kildare 
Gardens,  a  distance  of  about  three  miles  from  Hogarth  Road, 
and  I  had  not  mentioned  in  any  way  my  intention  of  trying 
this  experiment  to  either  of  the  above  ladies,  for  the  simple 
reason  that  it  was  only  on  retiring  to  rest  upon  this  Sunday 
night  that  I  made  up  my  mind  to  do  so.  The  time  at  which  I 
determined  that  I  would  be  there  was  one  o'clock  in  the  morn- 
ing ;  and  I  also  had  a  strong  intention  of  making  my  presence 
perceptible.  On  the  following  Thursday  I  went  to  see  the  ladies 
in  question,  and,  in  the  course  of  my  conversation  (without  any 
allusion  to  the  subject  on  my  part),  the  elder  one  told  me  that 
on  the  previous  Sunday  night  she  had  been  much  terrified  by 
perceiving  me  standing  by  her  bedside,  and  that  she  screamed 
when  the  apparition  advanced  towards  her,  and  awoke  her  little 
sister,  who  also  saw  me. 

"I  asked  her  if  she  was  awake  at  the  time,  and  she  replied 
most  decidedly  in  the  affirmative ;  and,  upon  my  inquiring  the 
time  of  the  occurrence,  she  replied,  '  About  one  o'clock  in  the 
morning.' 

"This  lady  at  my  request  wrote  down  a  statement  of  the 
event,  and  signed  it.   .  .   /' 

Mr.  Gurney  (one  of  the  authors  of  Phantasms  of  the 
Living),  became  deeply  interested  in  these  experiments 
and  requested  Mr.  B.  to  notify  him  in  advance  of  the 
next  occasion  when  he  proposed  to  make  his  presence 
known  in  this  strange  manner.  Accordingly,  March  22, 
1884,  he  received  the  following  note : — 

Dear  Mr.  Gurney, — I  am  going  to  try  the  experiment 
to-night  of  making  my  presence  perceptible  at  44  Morland 
Square,  at  12  P.M.  I  will  let  you  know  the  result  in  a  few  days. 
— Yours  very  sincerely,  S.  H.  B. 

The  next  letter,  which  was  written  on  April  3,  con- 
tained the  following  statement,  prepared  by  the  percipient, 
Miss  L.  S.  Verity : — 


DEATH  FROM  BEYOND  THE  VEIL   337 

"  On  Saturday  night,  March  22,  1884,  at  about  midnight,  I 
had  a  distinct  impression  that  Mr.  S.  H.  B.  was  present  in  my 
room,  and  I  distinctly  saw  him  while  I  was  quite  awake.  He 
came  towards  me  and  stroked  my  hair.  I  voluntarily  gave  him 
this  information  when  he  called  to  see  me  on  Wednesday, 
April  2,  telling  him  the  time  and  the  circumstances  of  the 
apparition  without  any  suggestion  on  his  part.  The  appearance 
in  my  room  was  most  vivid  and  quite  unmistakable." 

Miss  A.  S.  Verity  also  furnished  this  corroborative 
statement : — 

"  I  remember  my  sister  telling  me  that  she  had  seen  S.  H.  B., 
and  that  he  had  touched  her  hair,  hefore  he  came  to  see  us  on 
April  2." 

The  agent's  statement  of  the  affair  is  as  follows : — 

"  On  Saturday,  March  22,  I  determined  to  make  my  presence 
perceptible  to  Miss  V.  at  44  Morland  Square,  Netting  Hill,  at 
twelve  midnight ;  and  as  I  had  previously  arranged  with  Mr. 
Gurney  that  I  should  post  him  a  letter  on  the  evening  on  which 
I  tried  my  next  experiment  (stating  the  time  and  other  par- 
ticulars), I  sent  him  a  note  to  acquaint  him  with  the  above  facts. 
About  ten  days  afterwards  I  called  upon  Miss  V.,  and  she  volun- 
tarily told  me  that  on  March  22,  at  twelve  o'clock,  midnight,  she 
had  seen  me  so  vividly  in  her  room  (whilst  widely  awake)  that 
her  nerves  had  been  much  shaken,  and  she  had  been  obliged  to 
send  for  a  doctor  in  the  morning." 

Andrew  Lang,  in  The  Book  of  Dreams  and  Ghosts,  relates 
a  curious  but  authenticated  story  about  another  ''  send- 
ing "  of  the  ''  astral  body."     It  is  as  follows  : — 

"Mr.  Sparks  and  Mr.  Cleave,  young  men  of  twenty  and  nine- 
teen, were  accustomed  to  '  mesmerise '  each  other  in  their 
dormitory  at  Portsmouth,  where  they  were  students  of  naval 
engineering.  Mr.  Sparks  simply  stared  into  Mr.  Cleave's  eyes 
as  he  lay  on  his  bed  till  he  '  went  off.'     The  experiments  seemed 

Y 


oo> 


DEATH 


so  curious  that  witnesses  were  called,  Mr.  Darley  and  Mr.  Thur- 
good.  On  Friday,  January  15,  1886,  Mr.  Cleave  determined  to 
try  to  see,  when  asleep,  a  young  lady  at  Wandsworth,  to  whom 
he  was  in  the  habit  of  writing  every  Sunday.  He  also  intended, 
if  possible,  to  make  her  see  him.  On  awakening,  he  said  that 
he  had  seen  her  in  the  dining-room  of  her  house,  that  she  had 
seemed  to  grow  restless,  had  looked  at  him,  and  then  had 
covered  her  face  with  her  hands.  On  Monday  he  tried  again, 
and  he  thought  he  had  frightened  her,  as,  after  looking  at  him 
for  a  few  minutes,  she  fell  back  in  her  chair  in  a  kind  of  faint. 
Her  little  brother  was  in  the  room  with  her  at  the  time.  On 
Tuesday  next  the  young  lady  wrote,  telling  Mr.  Cleave  that  she 
had  been  startled  by  seeing  him  on  Friday  evening  (this  is  an 
error),  and  again  on  Monday  evening,  '  much  clearer,'  when  she 
nearly  fainted." 

At  Mr.  Giirney's  request,  Mr.  Cleave  wrote  an  account 
of  this  experience,  and  Mr.  Sparks,  Mr.  Darley,  and  Mr. 
Thurgood  corroborated  it  as  to  their  presence  during  the 
trance  as  well  as  to  Mr.  Cleave's  statements  when  he 
awoke.  The  young  woman's  statement,  dated  Janu- 
ary 19,  and  post-marked  "Portsmouth,  January  20," 
was  also  produced.  In  this  letter  she  mentions  her 
first  vision  of  Mr.  Cleave  as  occurring  on  Tuesday  (not 
Friday),  and  her  second,  while  she  was  alone  with  her 
little  brother  at  supper  on  Monday. 

In  commenting  upon  this  fact,  Mr.  Lang  adds : — 

"  But  the  very  discrepancy  in  Miss 's  letter  is  proof  of 

fairness.  Her  first  vision  of  Mr.  Cleave  was  on  '  Tuesday  last.' 
Mr.  Cleave's  first  impression  of  success  was  on  the  Friday  follow- 
ing.    But  he  had  been  making  the  experiment  for  five  nights 

previous,  including  the  Tuesday  of  Miss 's  letter.     Had  the 

affair  been  a  hoax,  Miss would  either  have  requested  him 

to  re-write  her  letter,  putting  Friday  for  Tuesday,  or,  what  is 
simpler,  Mr.  Cleave  would  have  adopted  her  version  and  written 
'  Tuesday  '  in  place  of  '  Friday.'  " 


DEATH  FROM  BEYOND  THE  VEIL   339 

In  other  words,  in  Mr.  Lang's  opinion,  the  apparent 
error  in  dates  actually  tends  to  prove  the  accuracy  of  all 
the  statements  about  the  experiment. 

Goethe  declares  that  he  once  met  himself  face  to  face 
at  a  certain  place,  and  noticed  that  he  was  wearing  some- 
what peculiar  garb.  Several  years  later  he  found  him- 
self in  the  same  place,  wearing  the  same  costume.  Some 
of  Shelley's  friends  once  saw  him  at  Lerici,  when  he 
was  not  there — in  the  flesh  at  least.  He  passed  along 
a  balcony  in  full  view  of  all,  and  disappeared  as 
mysteriously  as  he  had  come,  although  there  was  no 
exit  through  which  a  man  could  have  passed.  Mark 
Twain,  who  was  much  interested  in  psychic  research, 
relates  that,  at  a  crowded  reception,  he  saw  a  woman 
whom  he  had  not  met  for  many  years.  Although  she 
approached  him,  he  lost  sight  of  her  just  before  she 
reached  him,  and,  when  later  he  met  her  in  reality-,  he 
discovered  that  she  was  in  a  railway  train,  travelling 
towards  that  town,  at  the  moment  her  apparition  had 
appeared  to  him. 

These  may  be  hallucinations,  but  it  is  not  so  easy  to 
account  for  the  following  tale,  which  is  taken  from  the 
Journal  of  the  American  Society  for  Psychical  Hescarch^ 
December  1907.  Like  many  of  the  experiences  related 
in  Phantasms  of  the  Living,  it  suggests  possibilities  that 
are  entitled  to  serious  consideration.  The  story  is  as 
follows : — 

**  At  one  o'clock  on  Sunday  morning,  I  was  awakened  from 
a  perfectly  sound,  dreamless  sleep,  with  the  consciousness  that 
some  one  was  in  the  room.  On  becoming  clearly  awake,  I  saw 
standing  at  the  foot  of  the  bed  my  wife.  I  remember  she  wore 
a  dress  which  she  ordinarily  wore  about  the  house  when  attend- 
ing to  her  morning  duties.  I  was  not  conscious  until  later  that 
the  room  was  absolutely  dark.  In  dress,  and  every  other  way, 
my  wife  appeared  perfectly  natural. 


340  DEATH 

"  I  half  sprung  up  in  bed,  and  exclaimed,  '  What  are  you 
doing  here?'  She  replied,  'I  thought  I  would  come  out  and 
see  how  you  are  getting  along.'  She  walked  around  from  the 
foot  of  the  bed,  where  she  was  standing,  to  the  side  and  head  of 
the  bed  where  I  was  lying,  bent  over,  kissed  me,  and  disap- 
peared. In  an  instant  I  sprang  to  my  feet,  realised  then  that 
the  room  was  absolutely  dark,  lighted  the  gas,  and,  as  a  result 
of  the  experience,  was  nervously  in  a  chill,  with  the  cold  per- 
spiration starting  out  all  over  the  body. 

"  On  going  down  to  the  breakfast  table  the  next  morning,  I 
related  the  experience  to  both  Dr.  K.  and  Mr.  P.  I  was  so 
worried  by  the  whole  experience,  in  spite  of  what  I  supposed 
was  usually  good,  common  sense,  I  made  up  a  sham  telegram 
and  sent  it  to  my  wife,  asking  if  a  letter  had  come  making  a 
certain  engagement.  Later  in  the  day  I  received  her  reply, 
'  No  such  engagement ;  we  are  all  well.' 

"  Upon  returning  to  my  home  several  days  later,  I  was  at 
once  impressed  with  the  fact  that  my  wife  was  interested  with 
regard  to  my  sleeping  on  Saturday  night.  After  some  sparring 
over  the  matter,  I  finally  asked  her  why  she  asked  the  ques- 
tions she  did.  She  then  told  me  that  she  had  been  reading 
Hudson's  Psychic  Phenomena,  in  which  he  had  stated  that  if  a 
person  fixed  his  mind  just  at  the  point  of  losing  consciousness 
in  sleep  upon  another  person,  and  the  desire  to  meet  that 
person  under  certain  conditions,  that  the  result  with  the  second 
party  would  be  practically  as  determined  by  the  original 
experimenter. 

"  After  reading  me  the  extract  from  Hudson,  she  told  me 
that,  on  retiring  on  Saturday  night,  she  had  fixed  her  mind 
upon  the  fact  that  at  one  o'clock  in  the  morning  she  would 
appear  to  me,  and  kiss  me. 

"  The  above  are  the  facts  as  I  now  remember  them.  I  have 
never  had  a  similar  experience,  and  though  she  has  confessed 
to  me  that  she  has  tried  the  same  experiment  at  other  times, 
it  has  never  proved  successful,  unless  it  may  have  been  in  some 
disturbing  dream. — Very  sincerely  yours, 

"  C.  W.  S." 


I 


DEATH  FROM  BEYOND  THE  VEIL   341 

Dr.  Hyslop  has  in  his  possession  the  original  letter  of 
Mrs.  S.,  wife  of  Mr.  S.,  in  which  she  describes  her 
experiment.  This  was  sent  to  him  by  Dr.  Funk,  and  it 
made  unnecessary  the  re-writing  of  the  whole  experi- 
ence. It  was  not  possible  to  obtain  the  exact  date  of 
the  experiment  described.  The  letter  to  Dr.  Funk  was 
written  before  the  above  account  of  the  experience  as 
submitted  by  Mr.  S.  The  original  narrative  is  as 
follows : — 

"  Having  read  a  convincing  statement  made  by  Mr.  Thomp- 
son Jay  Hudson,  in  his  Laio  of  Psychic  Phenomena,  to  the  effect 
that  by  a  mental  process  it  is  possible  to  appear  in  visible  form 
to  people  at  a  distance  from  one's  self,  I  tried  the  experiment 
some  years  ago,  with  my  husband  as  object.  According  to  Mr 
Hudson's  directions,  I  went  to  sleep  one  night  (at  home,  in 
Derby,  Conn.),  willing  myself  to  appear  to  my  husband  in  his 
room,  whether  in  New  York  City,  Syracuse,  Schenectady,  or 
Buffalo,  I  do  not  now  remember.  My  purpose  was  to  awaken 
him  from  sleep,  to  attract  his  attention  to  myself  as  I  stood  on 
the  opposite  side  of  the  room,  and,  as  some  act  seemed  neces- 
sary to  the  drama,  to  walk  over  to  his  bedside  and  kiss  him  on 
the  forehead.  (I  do  not  remember  having  spoken  or  intending 
to  speak.) 

"  I  remember  holding  the  matter  well  in  mind  as  long  as  I 
was  conscious.  Several  days  later  my  husband  returned.  I 
was  most  anxious  to  know  the  result  of  my  efforts,  but  did  not 
wish  to  ask  him  outright  for  fear  of  hearing  of  failure  on 
my  part.  After  various  general  remarks  on  both  sides  with 
regard  to  the  health  of  each  during  his  absence,  my  husband 
asked  pointedly,  '  What  have  you  been  doing  since  I've  been 
gone?  Have  you  tried  any  of  your  psychic  experiments  on 
me  1 '  (He  knew  that  I  had  been  reading  the  book,  but  up  to 
that  time  I  had  not  presumed  to  attempt  anything  of  that  sort 
myself,  and  he  had  nothing  to  base  his  question  on  except  my 
general  interest  in  the  subject.) 

"I  replied,  'Why,  what  has  happened?'     Then  he  told  me 


342  DEATH 

that  he  had  awakened  suddenly,  out  of  a  sound  sleep,  on 
Saturday  night,  about  eleven  o'clock,  and  was  frightened 
by  seeing  me  standing  in  the  room.  So  real  did  I  seem 
that  he  exclaimed,  '  Rosa,  why  are  you  here  ? '  With  that  I 
walked  over  to  his  bedside,  kissed  him  on  the  forehead,  and 
was  gone. 

"  He  was  thoroughly  shaken  and  alarmed,  and  did  not  sleep 
again  for  hours.  Then  I  confessed  my  part  of  the  experience. 
The  only  detail  that  did  not  tally  in  the  working  out  of  the 
thought  with  the  original  plan  had  to  do  with  time.  I  had  in 
mind  one  o'clock,  and  he  saw  the  vision  at  eleven,  or  vice  versa. 
The  hour  was  not  correct. 

''  My  husband  begged  me  to  try  nothing  more  of  the  sort  on 
Saturday  night,  since  it  upset  him  sadly  for  his  Sunday  work. 

'•I  believe  this  is  substantially  the  whole  story. 

"  R.  T.  S." 

In  reply  to  inquiries  for  further  information  regarding 
certain  features  of  his  experience,  Mr.  S.  makes  the 
following  statements : — 

"  New  York,  June  25,  1907. 

'*  My  dear  Dr.  Hyslop, — Very  briefly,  for  I  have  only  a 
moment,  the  answers  to  your  questions  are  as  follows  : — 

"  1.  I  did  not  notice  that  the  room  was  dark  until  after  the 
apparent  disappearance  of  my  wife. 

''  2.  My  attention  was  not  drawn  to  the  fact  with  regard  to 
the  light  in  the  room  any  more  than  it  would  have  been  if 
my  wife  had  walked  into  any  ordinary  room  at  any  time  in 
the  day. 

'*3.  This  question  which  you  ask  is  a  difficult  one  to  answer. 
Psychologically  I  am  not  sure  just  at  what  point  I  was  fully 
awake.  At  the  cessation  of  the  experience  I  found  myself 
sitting  half  out  of  bed,  in  a  dripping  perspiration.  The 
impression,  as  I  look  back,  is  that  of  an  actual  occurrence  and 
in  no  way  a  dream. 


DEATH  FROM  BEYOND  THE  VEIL   343 

"  4.  There  was  no  consciousness  on  my  part  of  the  presence 
of  any  other  person  in  the  room  other  than  my  wife. 

"  5.  So  far  as  I  know,  Mrs.  S.  had  no  impressions  beyond 
those  accompanying  the  resolution  just  before  going  to  sleep, 
as  I  have  stated  it  in  my  letter. 

"6.  I  have  never  had  any  experience  of  this  nature  previous 
to  or  since  this. — Very  truly  yours,  C.  W.  S." 

As  both  persons  concerned  in  this  case  are  known  to 
be  eminently  honest  and  trustworthy,  the  possibility  of 
conscious  deception  may  be  said  to  be  practically  elimi- 
nated. As  Dr.  Hyslop  says,  in  commenting  upon  the 
experience : — 

"  The  psychologically  interesting  incident  of  these  replies 
is  found  in  the  answer  to  question  second.  The  phenomenon 
shows  a  resemblance  to  the  hypnogogic  condition  which  often 
precedes  or  follows  certain  cases  of  sleep.  It  involves  that 
action  of  the  optical  centres  which  show  that  they  may  con- 
tinue their  dream  or  hallucinatory  functioning  while  the  central 
self-consciousness  is  normally  awake.  It  suggests  a  more  or 
less  central  source  of  the  phantasms  which  accompany  the  con- 
dition, though  they  may  have  an  extraneous  origin  in  respect  to 
their  stimuli." 

The  next  case  we  take  from  Dr.  I.  K.  Funk's  book.  The 
Psychic  Riddle  (Funk  &  Wagnalls  Co.),  pp.  179-184,  quot- 
ing only  that  passage  which  directly  bears  on  our  pro- 
blem. The  narrator,  in  this  instance,  was  an  educated  man, 
a  physician  of  standing,  who  had  been  suffering  for  some 
time  past  from  a  remarkable  malady,  which  rendered 
complete  control  of  his  body  impossible.  After  describ- 
ing some  of  his  early  experiences,  he  goes  on  : — 

"  After  a  little  while  I  put  out  the  light  and  retired,  but  no 
sooner  had  I  done  this  than  the  action  became  more  rapid,  and 
I  could  feel  it  almost  as  though  it  was  a  creeping  sensation 
moving  up  my  legs.     I  got  up  and  lit  the  gas  and  went  back  to 


344  DEATH 

bed  ;  with  pillows  arranged  in  such  a  way  as  to  make  me  com- 
fortable. In  a  comparatively  short  time  all  circulation  ceased 
in  my  legs,  and  they  were  as  cold  as  those  of  the  dead.  The 
creeping  sensation  began  in  the  lower  part  of  my  body,  and 
that  also  became  cold.  .  .  .  There  was  no  sensation  of 
pain  or  even  of  physical  discomfort.  I  would  pinch  my  legs 
with  my  thumb  and  finger,  and  there  was  no  feeling  or  no  indi- 
cation of  blood  whatever.  I  might  as  well  have  pinched  a  piece 
of  rubber  so  far  as  the  sensation  produced  was  concerned.  As 
the  movement  continued  upward,  all  at  once  there  came  a  flash- 
ing of  lights  in  my  eyes  and  a  ringing  in  my  ears,  and  it  seemed 
for  an  instant  as  though  I  had  become  unconscious.  When 
I  came  out  of  this  state,  I  seemed  to  be  walking  in  the  air. 
No  words  can  describe  the  exhilaration  and  freedom  that  I 
experienced.  No  words  can  describe  the  clearness  of  mental 
vision.  At  no  time  in  my  life  had  my  mind  been  so  clear  and 
so  free.  Just  then  I  thought  of  a  friend  who  was  more  than  a 
thousand  miles  distant.  Then  I  seemed  to  be  travelling  with 
great  rapidity  through  the  atmosphere  about  me.  Everything 
was  light,  and  yet  it  was  not  the  light  of  the  day  or  the  sun, 
but,  I  might  say,  a  peculiar  light  of  its  own,  such  as  I  had  never 
known.  It  could  not  have  been  a  minute  after  I  thought 
of  my  friend,  before  I  was  conscious  of  standing  in  a  room 
where  the  gas  jets  were  turned  up,  and  my  friend  was  standing 
with  his  back  toward  me,  but,  suddenly  turning  and  seeing  me, 
said,  *  What  in  the  world  are  you  doing  here  ?  I  thought  you 
were  in  Florida ' — and  he  started  to  come  toward  me.  While 
I  heard  the  words  distinctly,  I  was  unable  to  answer.  An 
instant  later  I  was  gone,  and  the  consciousness  of  the  things 
that  transpired  that  memorable  night  will  never  be  for- 
gotten. I  seemed  to  leave  the  earth,  and  everything  per- 
taining to  it,  and  enter  a  condition  of  life  of  which  it  is 
absolutely  impossible  to  give  here  any  thought  I  had  concern- 
ing it,  because  there  was  no  correspondence  to  anything  I 
had  ever  seen  or  heard  or  known  of  in  any  way.  The  wonder 
and  the  joy  of  it  was  unspeakable ;  and  I  can  readily  under- 
stand now  what  Paul  meant  when  he  said,  '  I  knew  a  man, 
whether  in  the  body  or  out  of  it  I  know  not,  who  was  caught 


DEATH  FROM  BEYOND  THE  VEIL   345 

up  to  the  third  heaven,  and  there  saw  things  which  it  was  not 
possible  (lawful)  to  utter.' 

"  In  this  latter  experience  there  was  neither  consciousness  of 
time  nor  of  space ;  in  fact,  it  can  be  described  more  as  a  con- 
sciousness of  elastic  feeling  than  anything  else.  It  came  to  me 
after  a  time  that  I  could  stay  there  if  I  so  desired,  but  with 
that  thought  came  also  the  consciousness  of  the  friends  on 
earth  and  the  duties  there  required  of  me.  The  desire  to  stay 
was  intense,  but  in  my  mind  I  clearly  reasoned  over  it, — 
whether  I  should  gratify  my  desire  or  return  to  my  work  on 
earth.  Four  times  my  thought  and  reason  told  me  that  my 
duties  required  me  to  return,  but  I  was  so  dissatisfied  with 
each  conclusion  that  I  finally  said,  '  Now  I  will  think  and 
reason  this  matter  out  once  more,  and  whatever  conclusion  I 
reach  I  will  abide  by.'  I  reached  the  same  conclusion,  and 
I  had  not  much  more  than  reached  it  when  I  became  con- 
scious of  being  in  a  room  and  looking  down  on  a  body  propt 
up  in  bed,  which  I  recognised  as  my  own.  I  cannot  tell  what 
strange  feelings  came  over  me !  This  body,  to  all  intents 
and  purposes  looked  to  be  dead.  There  was  no  indication  of 
life  about  it,  and  yet  here  I  was  apart  from  the  body,  with 
my  mind  thoroughly  clear  and  alert,  and  the  consciousness  of 
another  body  to  which  matter  of  any  kind  offered  no 
resistance. 

"After  what  might  have  been  a  minute  or  two,  looking  at 
the  body,  I  began  to  try  and  control  it,  and  in  a  very  short 
time  all  sense  of  separation  from  the  physical  body  ceased, 
and  I  was  only  conscious  of  a  directed  effort  towards  its  use. 
After  what  seemed  to  be  quite  a  long  time,  I  was  able  to 
move,  got  up  from  the  bed,  dressed  myself,  and  went  down 
to  breakfast. 

"  I  may  add  here  that  the  friend  referred  to  as  having 
been  seen  by  me  that  night  was  also  distinctly  conscious  of 
my  presence  and  made  the  exclamation  mentioned.  We  both 
wrote  the  next  day,  relating  the  experiences  of  the  night, 
and  the  letters  corroborating  the  incident  crossed  in  the  post." 

Dr.    Funk   states   that   the    author   of  this    narrative 


34G  DEATH 

has  long   been  known  to  him,  and   that   he  has  every 
confidence  in  his  honour  and  powers  of  observation. 

A  most  interesting  case  of  this  kind  is  given  in  Mr. 
Myers'  paper  ''  On  Indications  of  Continued  Terrene 
Knowledge  on  the  Part  of  Phantasms  of  the  Dead," 
in  Proceedings  S.  P.  R.,  vol.  viii.,  pp.  180-93.  We 
quote  some  passages  from  this  account,  which  is  of 
great  interest,  as  apparently  showing  the  disunion  of 
soul  and  body.  The  narrator  is  again  a  physician, 
and  sworn  statements  from  several  witnesses  are  in- 
cluded in  the  original  report,  together  with  answers 
to  a  number  of  questions  by  Dr.  Hodgson.  The  narra- 
tive runs  in  part  as  follows : — 

'*  I  passed  four  hours  in  all  without  pulse  or  perceptible 
heart-beat,  as  I  am  informed  by  Dr.  S.  H.  Raynes,  who  was 
the  only  physician  present.  During  a  portion  of  this  time 
several  of  the  bystanders  thought  I  was  dead,  and,  such  a 
report  being  carried  outside,  the  village  church  bell  was  tolled. 
Dr.  Raynes  informs  me,  however,  that  by  bringing  his  eyes 
close  to  my  face,  he  could  perceive  an  occasional  short  gasp, 
so  very  light  as  to  be  barely  perceptible,  and  that  he  was 
upon  the  point  several  times  of  saying,  'He  is  dead,'  when 
a  gasp  would  occur  in  time  to  check  him. 

"He  thrust  a  needle  deep  into  the  flesh  at  different  points 
from  the  feet  to  the  hips,  but  got  no  response.  Although 
I  was  pulseless  for  four  hours,  the  state  of  apparent  death 
lasted  only  about  half-an-hour. 

"  I  lost,  I  believe,  all  power  of  thought  or  knowledge  of 
existence  in  absolute  unconsciousness.  Of  course,  I  need  not 
guess  at  the  time  so  lost,  as  in  such  a  state  a  minute  or  a 
thousand  years  would  appear  the  same.  I  came  again  into 
a  state  of  conscious  existence,  and  discovered  that  I  was  still 
in  the  body,  but  the  body  and  I  had  no  longer  any  interests 
in  common.  I  looked  in  astonishment  and  joy  for  the  first 
time  upon  myself — the  me,  the  real  Ego,  while  the  not-me 
closed  it  upon  all  sides  like  a  sepulchre  of  clay. 


DEATH  FROM  BEYOND  THE  VEIL   347 

"With  all  the  interest  of  a  physician  I  beheld  the  wonders 
of  my  bodily  anatomy,  intimately  interwoven  with  which, 
even  tissue  for  tissue,  was  I,  the  living  soul  of  that  dead  body  ! 
I  learned  that  the  epidermis  was  the  outside  boundary  of  the 
ultimate  tissues,  so  to  speak,  of  the  soul.  I  realised  my  con- 
dition and  calmly  reasoned  thus:  I  have  died,  as  man  terms 
death,  and  yet  I  am  as  much  a  man  as  ever.  I  am  about  to 
get  out  of  the  body.  I  watched  the  interesting  process  of 
the  separation  of  soul  and  body.  By  some  power,  apparently 
not  my  own,  the  Ego  was  rocked  to  and  fro,  laterally,  as  the 
cradle  is  rocked,  by  which  process  its  connection  with  the 
tissues  of  the  body  was  broken  up.  After  a  little  time,  the 
lateral  motion  ceased,  and  along  the  soles  of  the  feet,  beginning 
at  the  toes,  passing  rapidly  to  the  heels,  I  felt  and  heard, 
as  it  seemed,  the  snapping  of  innumerable  small  cords.  When 
this  was  accomplished,  I  began  slowly  to  retreat  from  the  feet, 
toward  the  head,  as  a  rubber  chord  shortens.  I  remember 
reaching  the  hips,  and  saying  to  myself,  'Now,  there  is  no 
life  below  the  hips.'  I  can  recall  no  memory  of  passing  through 
the  abdomen  and  chest,  but  recollect  distinctly  when  my  whole 
self  was  collected  in  the  head,  when  I  reflected  thus  :  'I  am  all 
the  head  now,  and  I  shall  soon  be  free.'  I  passed  around  the 
brain  as  if  it  were  hollow,  compressing  it  and  its  membranes, 
slightly  on  all  sides,  towards  the  centre,  and  peeped  out  between 
the  sutures  of  the  skull,  emerging  like  the  flattened  edges  of  a 
bag  of  membranes !  I  recollect  distinctly  how  I  appeared  to 
myself  something  like  a  jelly-fish  as  regards  colour  and  form  ! 
As  I  emerged,  I  saw  two  ladies  sitting  at  my  head.  I  measured 
the  distance  between  the  head  of  my  cot  and  the  knees  of  the 
lady  opposite  the  head,  and  concluded  there  was  room  for  me 
to  stand,  but  felt  considerable  embarrassment  as  I  reflected  that 
I  was  about  to  emerge  naked  before  her,  but  comforted  myself 
with  the  thought  that  in  all  probability  she  would  not  see  me 
with  her  bodily  eyes,  as  I  was  a  spirit.  As  I  emerged  from 
the  head,  I  floated  up  laterally  like  a  soap-bubble  attached  to 
the  bowl  of  a  pipe,  until  I  at  last  broke  loose  from  the  body  and 
fell  lightly  to  the  floor,  where  I  slowly  rose  and  expanded  to 
the  full  stature  of   a  man.     I  seemed  to  be  translucent,  of  a 


348  DEATH 

bluish  cast  and  perfectly  naked.  With  a  painful  sense  of 
embarrassment,  I  fled  toward  the  partially  opened  door  to 
escape  the  eyes  of  the  two  ladies  whom  I  was  facing,  as  well  as 
others  who  I  knew  were  about  me,  but  upon  reaching  the 
door  I  found  myself  clothed,  and  satisfied  upon  that  point,  I 
turned  and  faced  the  company.  As  I  turned,  my  left  elbow 
came  in  contact  with  the  arm  of  one  of  two  gentlemen,  who 
were  standing  in  the  door.  To  my  surprise,  his  arm  passed 
through  mine  without  apparent  resistance,  the  several  parts 
closing  again  without  pain,  as  air  reunites.  I  looked  quickly 
up  at  his  face  to  see  if  he  had  noticed  the  contact,  but  he  gave 
me  no  sign — only  stood  and  gazed  toward  the  couch  I  had  just 
left.  I  directed  my  gaze  in  the  direction  of  his,  and  saw  my 
dead  body. 

"  Suddenly  I  discovered  that  I  was  looking  at  the  straight 
seam  down  the  back  of  my  coat,  '  How  is  this,  I  thought,  how 
do  I  see  my  back  ? '  and  I  looked  again,  to  reassure  myself, 
down  the  back  of  the  coat,  or  down  the  back  of  my  legs  to  the 
very  heels.  I  put  my  hand  to  my  face  and  felt  for  my  eyes. 
They  were  where  they  should  be  :  I  thought,  '  Am  I  like  an  owl 
that  I  can  turn  my  head  half-way  round  ? '  I  tried  the  experi- 
ment and  failed. 

"No!  Then  it  must  be  that,  having  been  out  of  the  body, 
but  a  few  moments,  I  have  yet  the  power  to  use  the  eyes  of  the 
body,  and  I  turned  about  and  looked  back  in  at  the  open  door, 
where  I  could  see  the  head  of  my  body  in  a  line  with  me.  I 
discovered  then  a  small  cord,  like  a  spider's  web,  running  from 
my  shoulders  back  to  my  body  and  attaching  to  it  at  the  base  of 
the  neck,  in  front. 

"  I  was  satisfied  with  the  conclusion  that  by  means  of  that 
cord,  I  was  using  the  eyes  of  my  body,  and,  turning,  walked 
down  the  street.^ 

^  This  has  frequently  been  described  by  clairvoyants,  and  others.  See 
A.  J.  Davis'  account,  given  above.  Numbers  of  others  of  like  nature  could 
be  cited.  It  is  generally  asserted  that  so  long  as  this  cord  remains  un- 
broken, re-manifestation  in  the  body  is  possible  ;  but  if  it  gets  ruptured 
for  any  reason,  re-habitation  of  the  body  becomes  impossible.  In  natural 
death,  it  is  asserted  that  this  cord  snaps  some  minutes  after  the  spiritual 
body  has  completely  emerged  from  the  material  body. 


DEATH  FROM  BEYOND  THE  VEIL   349 

"  A  small,  densely  black  cloud  appeared  in  front  of  me  and 
advanced  toward  my  face.  I  knew  that  I  was  to  be  stopped. 
I  felt  the  power  to  move  or  to  think  leaving  me.  My  hands 
fell  powerless  to  my  side,  my  shoulders  and  my  head  dropped 
forward,  the  cloud  touched  my  face  and  I  knew  no  more. 

*'  Without  previous  thought  and  without  effort  on  my  part, 
my  eyes  opened.  I  looked  at  my  hands  and  then  at  the  little 
white  cot  upon  which  I  was  lying,  and,  realising  that  I  was 
in  the  body,  in  astonishment  and  disappointment,  I  ex- 
claimed :  '  What  in  the  world  has  happened  to  me  ?  Must  I 
die  again  V  .  .  ." 

Many  cases  of  a  like  nature  are  to  be  found  in  the 
Proceedings  of  the  Society  for  Psychical  Research,  and  in 
Mr.  F.  W.  H.  Myers'  Human  Personality.  A  remarkable 
case  of  a  somewhat  different  character,  but  more  eviden- 
tial in  that  the  "  double  "  was  seen  by  another  person,  is 
the  following  instance,  narrated  in  Phantasms  of  the  Living, 
vol.  i.,  pp.  225-6,  by  the  Rev.  P.  H.  Newnham,  as 
follows  : — 

"  In  March  1854,  I  was  up  at  Oxford,  keeping  my  last  term, 
in  lodgings.  I  was  subject  to  violent  neuralgic  headaches, 
which  always  culminated  in  sleep.  One  evening,  about  8  p.m., 
I  had  an  unusually  violent  one ;  when  it  became  unendurable, 
about  9  P.M.,  I  went  into  my  bedroom,  and  flung  myself,  without 
undressing,  on  the  bed,  and  soon  fell  asleep. 

"  I  then  had  a  singularly  clear  and  vivid  dream,  all  the  inci- 
dents of  which  are  still  as  clear  in  my  memory  as  ever.  I 
dreamed  that  I  was  stopping  with  the  family  of  a  lady  who 
subsequently  became  my  wife.  All  the  younger  ones  had  gone 
to  bed,  and  I  stopped  chatting  to  the  father  and  mother,  stand- 
ing up  by  the  fireplace.  Presently  I  bade  them  good  night,  took 
my  candle,  and  went  off  to  bed.  On  arriving  in  the  hall,  1  per- 
ceived that  m.y  fiancee  had  been  detained  downstairs,  and  was 
only  then  near  the  top  of  the  staircase.  I  rushed  upstairs, 
overtook  her  on  the  top  step,  and  passed  my  two  arms  around 
her  waist,  under  her  arms,  from  behind.     Although  I  was  carry- 


350  DEATH 

ing  my  candle  in  my  left  hand,  when  I  ran  upstairs,  this  did 
not,  in  my  dream,  interfere  with  this  gesture. 

**0n  this  I  woke,  and  a  clock  in  the  house  struck  ten  almost 
immediately  afterwards. 

"  So  strong  was  the  impression  of  the  dream  that  I  wrote  a 
detailed  account  of  it  the  next  morning  to  my  Jiancee. 

"  Crossing  my  letter,  not  in  answer  to  it,  I  received  a  letter 
from  the  lady  in  question  :  '  Were  you  thinking  about  me  very 
specially  last  night,  just  about  ten  o'clock  1  For,  as  I  was  going 
upstairs  to  bed,  I  distinctly  heard  your  footsteps  on  the  stairs, 
and  felt  you  put  your  arms  round  my  waist.' " 

Mrs.  Newnbam's  confirmation  of  this  account  was 
received. 

Such  cases  would  surely  seem  to  indicate  that  the 
spiritual  body  is  more  or  less  detachable  from  the  mate- 
rial body,  and,  that  once  granted,  materialism  would  be 
overthrown,  and  the  case  practically  won  for  some  sort 
of  spiritualism. 

3.  The  Process  of  Dying  as  Described  by 
"Spirits." 

Throughout  spiritualistic  literature  there  exists  a  great 
mass  of  evidence  on  this  subject  of  the  future  life ; 
and  we  are  told  with  the  utmost  detail  and  precision 
exactly  what  we  shall  do  when  we  come  to  pass  the 
"  great  divide  "  ourselves,  what  our  occupations  shall  be, 
and  in  fact  all  about  the  future  state.  If  we  could 
believe  these  statements,  the  future  must  be  a  very 
rational  sort  of  existence — not  very  far  removed  from 
our  present  state;  and,  in  fact,  if  we  can  credit  the  state- 
ments made  by  Mr.  John  K.  Wilson,  in  his  singular  book 
Death  :  its  Meanings  and  Results,  things  must  be  very  much 
the  same  as  they  are  here.  Throughout  the  three  large 
volumes  of  The  Encyclo'paidia  of  Death,  are  to  be  found 


DEATH  FROM  BEYOND  THE  VEIL    351 

many  passages  of  the  kind  ;  and,  indeed,  the  volumes  are 
mostly  taken  up  with  spiritualistic  material  of  this  sort. 
From  such  passages  we  select  the  following  narrative 
as  of  especial  interest  for  our  present  purpose — since  it 
describes  the  process  of  dying  very  minutely,  and  will 
be  found  to  agree,  largely,  with  the  descriptions  given  by 
clairvoyants  and  others  : — 

"When  I  awoke  in  the  spirit-life,  and  perceived  I  had  hands 
and  feet,  and  all  that  belongs  to  the  human  body,  I  cannot  ex- 
press to  you  in  form  of  words  the  feelings  which  at  that  moment 
seemed  to  take  possession  of  my  soul.  I  realised  that  I  had  a 
body — a  spiritual  body.  ...  I  realised  at  that  moment,  as  I  had 
never  done  before,  the  glorious  truth  of  my  own  unfoldings.  I 
had  expected  to  sleep  a  long  sleep  of  death,  and  awake  at  last, 
at  the  general  resurrection,  to  receive  commendation  or  con- 
demnation, according  to  the  deeds  done  in  the  body.  .  .  . 

"  Imagine  then,  if  you  can,  what  the  surprise  of  a  spirit  must 
be  to  find,  after  the  struggle  of  death,  that  he  is  a  new-born 
spirit,  from  the  decaying  tabernacle  of  flesh  that  he  leaves 
behind  him.  I  gazed  on  weeping  friends  with  a  saddened 
heart,  mingled  with  joy, — knowing,  as  I  did,  that  I  could  be 
with  them,  and  behold  them  daily,  though  unseen  and  unknown  ; 
and,  as  I  gazed  upon  the  lifeless  tenement  of  clay,  and  could 
behold  the  beauty  of  its  mechanism,  I  felt  impelled  to  seek  the 
author  of  so  much  beauty  and  use,  and  prostrate  myself  in 
adoration  at  his  feet.  I  felt  a  light  touch  on  my  shoulder,  and, 
joy  unspeakable  !  I  beheld  the  loved  ones  of  earth,  some  of 
whom  had  long  since  departed  from  the  earth  plane,  saying  to 
me,  '  Leave  this  sad  and  weeping  group  of  mourning  friends, 
and  come  with  us,  and  behold  your  future  home — your  place 
appointed  unto  you — and  be  introduced  by  us  into  the  society 
of  congenial  spirits,  who  have  long  known  you  while  sojourning 
on  the  earth  plane,  but  of  whose  presence  you  were  ignorant. 
And  I  felt  myself  ascending,  or  rather  floating  onward  and 
upward  through  the  regions  of  space ;  and  I  beheld  worlds  in- 
habited with  people  like  unto  those  who  dwell  upon  the  earth ; 


352  DEATH 

and  ascending  from  each  of  these  beautiful  orbs  were  freed 
spirits,  and  their  guides,  bearing  me  company  through  the  bright 
realms  of  immensity  .  .  ."  {Encyclopedia  of  Deaths  vol.  i.,  pp. 
47,  48). 

Again,  we  read  that  Judge  Edmonds,  when  describing 
his  death  through  the  lips  of  Cora  L.  V.  Tappan,  stated 
that — 

"  During  the  whole  of  the  death-change,  he  was  in  the  full 
and  clear  possession  of  his  faculties,  and  he  felt  no  pain, 
although  for  some  years  previously  he  had  been  suffering  from 
debility.  His  body  sank  into  sweet  repose,  whilst  his  spirit, 
already  free,  gazed  upon  it  as  one  would  look  upon  a  worn-out 
garment ;  he  was  not  aware  of  losing  any  faculty  ;  he  re-entered 
his  body  at  times  to  see  the  loved  ones  around  his  bed ;  and  he 
admonished  his  children  not  to  mourn.  He  sprang  into  the 
new  existence  as  one  would  leap  from  bonds  which  for  years 
had  encircled  him  and  chained  him  to  the  flesh  and  to  physical 
suffering — he  sprang  forth  delighted,  as  one  would  leap  into  a 
golden  sea,  which  immediately  gave  strength,  vigour,  and  immor- 
tality. .  .  ." 

In  the  record  of  experiences,  published  in  vol.  i., 
part  ii.,  of  the  Proceedings  of  the  American  Society  for 
Psychical  Research^  the  author,  "  G.  A.  T./'  asserts  that  an 
intelligence  purporting  to  be  that  of  his  deceased  father, 
frequently  communicated  with  him  by  means  of  auto- 
matic writing.  Some  of  the  answers  to  questions  are  of 
interest  in  this  connection,  even  if  it  is  impossible  to 
confirm  them.  Thus,  on  one  occasion,  this  intelligence 
was  asked  if  his  present  life  was  eternal.  To  this  the 
answer  was,  "  I  don't  know."  Asked  if  any  of  his  com- 
panions had  disappeared,  he  replied,  "  No."  To  ques- 
tions in  regard  to  the  lapse  of  time,  he  answered,  "  There 
is  no  time." 

When  conversing  with  what  purported  to  be  the  dis- 
carnate  spirit  of  a  friend  named  "  H.  R.,"  the  author 


DEATH  FROM  BEYOND  THE  VEIL   353 

asked  her  if  she  was  happy.  She  said,  "  Yes  ! " — "  I  asked 
her  if  she  was  happier  than  when  in  the  body,  and  she 
answered,  '  Yes,  far ! '  I  asked  if  the  spirits  hved  on 
earth  as  of  old,  and  the  reply  was,  '  We  can  stay  here  if 
we  wish.'  I  asked  if  it  was  her  desire  to  stay  here,  and 
she  said,  '  Yes.'  " 

The  communications  which  have  been  received  by 
Dr.  Hyslop,  purporting  to  come  from  Dr.  Hodgson, 
contain  many  references  regarding  the  conditions  exist- 
ing in  the  world  beyond  the  grave.  Many  of  these 
messages  belong  more  appropriately  to  a  later  chapter, 
"  Intracosmic  Difficulties  of  Communication,"  but  as  all 
the  facts  pertaining  to  this  subject  have  not  been  in- 
cluded in  the  discussion  of  that  phase  of  the  question, 
we  quote  the  following  from  the  Journal  of  the  American 
Society,  April  1907: — 

"  Thus,  after  some  reference  to  experiments  which  he  had 
wished  to  carry  out  while  living,  he  interrupted  the  communi- 
cations with  an  allusion  to  an  unverifiable  experience  after 
death.  He  said:  'It  is  delightful  to  go  up  through  the  cool 
ethereal  atmosphere  into  this  life  and  shake  off  the  mortal 
body.'  He  had  himself  believed  that  the  spiritual  world  was 
ethereal,  and  we  have  in  this  passage  one  of  the  many  inter- 
polations of  communicators  which  represent  possibilities  but  not 
evidence  of  what  these  phenomena  purport  to  be. 

"  At  another  sitting  '  he  became  greatly  excited  and  confused, 
and  the  hand  wrote  so  heavily  and  rapidly  that  it  tore  the  paper, 
and  when  we  managed  to  have  it  calm  down,  the  following 
came,  and  was  almost  likely  the  interpolation  of  the  control  or 
trance  personality  : — 

"  '  In  leaving  the  body  the  shock  to  the  spirit  knocks  every- 
thing out  of  one's  thoughts  for  awhile,  but  if  he  has  any  desire 
at  all  to  prove  his  identity  he  can  in  time  collect  enough  evi- 
dence to  prove  his  identity  convincingly.' 

"  To  try  a  question  which  was  designed  to  test  the  possibility 
of  our  getting  marginal  thoughts  of  the  communicator  instead 

Z 


354  DEATH 

of  the  main  ones  intended,  I  asked  at  this  latter  sitting  if  some 
of  the  thoughts  came  through  that  he  did  not  intend  to  send. 
The  answer  and  colloquy  was  as  follows  : — 

'"At  times  they  do,  and  then  again  his  thoughts  are  some- 
what changed.  They  are  not  exactly  what  they  were  when  in 
the  body.' 

"  '  Very  good — I  understand.' 

"  '  The  change  called  Death,  which  is  really  only  transition, 
is  very  different  from  what  one  thinks  before  he  experiences- it. 
That  in  part  explains  why  Myers  never  took  a  more  active 
part  after  he  came  over  here.  He  had  much  on  his  mind  before 
he  came  which  he  vowed  he  would  give  after  he  came  over,  but 
the  shock  was  such  that  many  of  his  determinations  were  shat- 
tered from  his  living  memory.  This  is  a  pretty  excuse  for  a 
living  reality — a  fact.  It  is  unmistakably  so  with  every  one 
who  crosses  the  border  line.' " 

Other  quotations  might  be  made,  but  these  are  suffi- 
cient to  indicate  the  character  of  the  communications 
that  purport  to  penetrate  from  the  "  Spirit  World." 


CHAPTER   IV 

EXPERIMENTS  IN  PHOTOGRAPHING  AND  IN  WEIGHING 

THE  SOUL 

1.  Experiments  in  Photographing  the  Soul. 

The  clairvoyant  descriptions  of  death,  and  of  what  takes 
place  at  that  moment,  are  of  great  interest — that  must 
be  granted,  no  matter  how  we  may  choose  to  interpret 
the  facts.  But  these  experiences  in  themselves — backed 
up,  as  they  are,  apparently,  by  the  statements  of 
so-called  Spirits — cannot  be  taken  as  conclusive,  in  the 
absence  of  any  external  evidence  tending  to  corroborate 
these  visions.  In  spite  of  the  a  'priori  improbability 
that  these  visions  should  agree  with  one  another  in  the 
marvellous  manner  they  do,  there  is  still  the  possibility 
that  these  perceptions  are  merely  subjective  hallucina- 
tions, coincidental  in  the  minds  of  several  seers.  But 
if  we  could  obtain  external  evidence  that  these  visions 
are  not  merely  subjective ;  if  we  could  obtain  such 
evidence  as  the  photographic  camera  and  the  balance 
afford,  then  we  should  assuredly  have  striking  proof — 
or  at  least  a  strong  presumption — that  something  does 
actually  leave  the  body  at  death,  and  that  this  "some- 
thmg  "  can  be  photographed  and  even  weighed. 

Having  these  considerations  in  mind,  then,  let  us  now 
turn  to  the  facts,  and  see  how  much  evidence  there  is 
that  such  phenomena  ever  have  occurred.  We  shall 
discuss  primarily  the  experiments  that  have  been  con- 

355 


356  DEATH 

ducted  in  photographing  the  soul — these  having  been 
made  by  Dr.  Hippolyte  Baraduc,  of  Paris.  This  physi- 
cian has  written  much  on  nervous  diseases,  on  the 
stomach,  gynaecology,  and  especially  upon  human  vitality. 
Of  late  years,  his  attention  had  been  called  to  the  possi- 
bility of  photographing  the  invisible ;  and  it  was  asserted 
that  he  had  succeeded  in  photographing  the  thought 
of  a  living  person,  and  obtaining  impressions  of  such 
"  thought-forms,"  created  by  the  living.  As  these  experi- 
ments will  naturally  open  the  way  for  our  consideration 
of  the  more  marvellous  experiments  to  follow,  we  shall 
commence  by  describing  these  researches — coming  to 
the  experiments  in  "  photographing  the  soul "  later  on. 

Dr.  Baraduc  asserted  that  he  had  obtained  photo- 
graphs of  human  radiations  and  of  human  thought, 
under  certain  conditions.  For  instance,  calm,  peaceful 
emotions  produce  pictures  of  softly  homogeneous  light, 
or  the  appearance  of  a  gentle  shower  of  snow-flakes 
against  a  black  background ;  whereas  sad  or  violent 
passions  suggest,  in  the  arrangement  of  the  light  and 
shadows,  the  idea  of  a  whirlpool  or  revolving  storm, 
somewhat  like  a  meteorological  diagram  representing  a 
cyclone.  If  these  photographs  are  really  what  they  are 
believed  to  be,  they  would  seem  to  indicate  that,  in  our 
ordinary  normal  condition,  we  emit  radiations  which  are 
regulated  and  flow  forth  in  smooth,  even  succession ; 
but  when  violent  emotions,  such  as  anger  or  fear,  break 
through  the  control  of  the  will  and  take  possession  of 
us,  they  produce  a  violent  and  confused  emission. 

There  is  no  reason,  a  priori,  why  the  soul  should  not 
be  a  space-occupying  body,  save  for  the  tradition  of 
theology.  For  all  that  we  know,  the  soul  might  be  a 
point  of  f^rce,  existing  within  and  animating  some  sort 
of  ethereal  body,  which  corresponds,  in  size  and  shape, 
to  our  material  body.     But  at  all   events,  there  is  an 


PHOTOGRAPHING  &  WEIGHING  THE  SOUL    357 

abundance  of  very  good  testimony  to  the  effect  that  the 
shape  of  the  spiritual  body  corresponds  to  that  of  the 
material  body ;  and,  as  such,  it  certainly  occupies  space, 
and  possibly  has  weight  also.  It  might  and  it  might 
not ;  it  is  a  question  of  evidence.  It  will  have  to  be 
settled,  if  at  all,  not  by  speculations,  but  by  fads.  Are 
there  any  facts,  then,  that  would  seem  to  indicate  that 
the  soul  might  be  photographed  ?  Have  we  any  evidence 
that  the  soul  may  be  photographed  under  certain  con- 
ditions, and  particularly  at  the  moment  of  death  ?  If 
so,  we  shall  have  advanced  a  great  step  in  our  know- 
ledge of  this  subject. 

Before  we  adduce  our  evidence  on  this  point,  however, 
it  may  be  well  to  illustrate  the  fact  tbat  there  is  no 
inherent  absurdity  in  the  idea,  as  many  might  suppose. 
Of  course  the  spuitual  body  would  have  to  be  material 
enough  to  reflect'  light  waves,  but  where  is  the  evidence 
that  it  is  not  ?  There  seems  to  be  much  evidence,  on 
the  contrary,  that  it  is.  And  it  must  be  remembered 
that  the  camera  will  disclose  innumerable  things  quite 
invisible  to  the  naked  eye,  or  even  to  the  eye  aided  by 
the  strongest  glasses  or  telescopes.  Normally,  we  can 
see  but  a  few  hundred  stars  in  the  sky ;  with  the  aid 
of  telescopes,  we  can  see  many  thousand ;  but  the  photo- 
graphic camera  discloses  more  than  twenty  million ! 
Here,  then,  is  direct  evidence  that  the  camera  can 
observe  things  which  we  cannot  see ;  and,  indeed,  this 
whole  process  of  sight  or  "  seeing "  is  a  far  more  com- 
plicated one  than  most  persons  imagine.  As  Sir  Oliver 
Lodge  has  recently  pointed  out  {Harpers  Magazine, 
August  1908),  there  is  no  reason  why  we  should  not 
be  enabled  to  photograph  a  spirit,  when  we  can  photo- 
graph an  image  in  a  mirror — which  is  composed  simply 
of  vibrations,  and  reflected  vibrations  at  that !  We  are 
a  long  way  from  the  tangible  thing,  in  such  a  case ;  and 


358  DEATH 

yet  we  are  enabled  to  photograph  it  with  an  ordinary 
camera.  Any  disturbance  in  the  ether  we  should 
be  enabled  to  photograph  likewise  —  if  only  we  had 
delicate  enough  instruments,  and  if  the  "  conditions  "  for 
the  experiment  were  favourable.  The  phenomena  of 
spirit-photography,  and  especially  the  experiments  of 
Dr.  Baraduc,  to  which  we  shall  immediately  recur,  would 
seem  to  be  proof  of  this. 

These  experiments,  as  well  as  those  that  are  about 
to  follow,  gain  greater  credibility  Avhen  considered  in 
the  light  of  the  newer  experimental  researches  in 
physics,  which  demonstrate,  apparently,  that  matter  can 
be  made  to  disintegrate  and  disappear,  and  can  be 
again  re-formed  from  invisible  vortices  in  the  ether  into 
sufficiently  solid  bodies  to  be  photographed  by  the 
sensitive  plate.  In  his  remarkable  work,  The  Evolution 
of  Matter,  Dr.  Gustave  Le  Bon  has  devoted  a  whole 
section  of  his  argument  to  what  he  has  denominated 
"  the  dematerialisation  of  matter."  He  proves  by  experi- 
ments in  the  physical  laboratory  that  matter  can  dis- 
sociate, and  vanish  into  apparent  nothingness.  What 
really  takes  place,  however,  is  that  the  solid  matter,  as 
we  have  been  accustomed  to  conceive  it,  is  resolved  into 
its  finer  constituent  parts — not  only  into  the  material 
atoms  of  which  it  is  composed,  but  these  atoms  are 
in  turn  dissociated  and  resolved  into  a  series  of  etheric 
vortices,  invisible  to  normal  sense  perception.  Appa- 
rently, therefore,  matter  has  ceased  to  be,  as  such ;  and, 
in  fact,  it  has  been  resolved  into  energy !  Conversely, 
Dr.  Le  Bon  proved  that,  by  producing  artificial  equilibria 
of  the  elements  arising  from  the  dissociation  of  matter, 
he  could  succeed  in  creating,  with  immaterial  particles, 
"  something  singularly  resembling  matter."  These  equi- 
libria were  maintained  a  sufficient  length  of  time  to 
enable  them  to  be  photographed. 


PHOTOGRAPHING  &  WEIGHING  THE  SOUL    359 

On  p.  164  of  Dr.  Le  Bon's  Evolution  of  Matter,  are  to 
be  found  photographs  of  what  is  practically  materialised 
matter.      This  author  says,  in  part : — 

"  Such  equilibria  can  only  be  maintained  for  a  moment.  If 
we  were  able  to  isolate  and  fix  them  for  good — that  is  to  say, 
so  that  they  would  survive  their  generating  cause — we  should 
have  succeeded  in  creating  with  immaterial  particles  some- 
thing singularly  resembling  matter.  The  enormous  quantity 
of  energy  condensed  within  the  atom  shows  the  impossibility 
of  realising  such  an  experiment.  But,  if  we  cannot  with 
immaterial  things  effect  equilibria,  able  to  survive  the  cause 
which  gave  them  birth,  we  can  at  least  maintain  them  for  a 
sufficiently  long  time  to  photograph  them,  and  thus  create  a 
sort  of  momentary  materialisation." 

If,  therefore,  physical  science  now  admits,  as  it  does, 
that  vibrations,  or  disturbances  in  the  ether,  can  be 
photographed,  there  is  no  longer  any  a  priori  objection 
to  these  experiments  by  Dr.  Baraduc — which  claim, 
merely,  that  similar  vibrations  have  been  photographed 
— such  vibrations  being  the  external  modification  or 
impression  left  upon  the  ether  by  the  causal  thought. 

So  much  for  theoretical  possibilities :  now  for  the 
facts. 

In  a  remarkable  little  booklet,  entitled,  Unseen  Faces 
Photographed,  Dr.  H.  A.  Reid  has  presented  a  number  of 
cases  of  supposed  spirit  photography,  some  of  which  are 
certainly  difficult  to  account  for  by  any  theory  of  fraud. 
It  is  true  that  the  methods  of  imitating  this  process 
by  fraudulent  means  are  numerous  and  ingenious ;  but 
practically  none  of  them  are  unknown  to  us.  In  The 
Physical  Phenomenct  of  Spiritualism,  pp.  206—23,  one  of 
us  has  described  these  fraudulent  methods  in  consider- 
able detail ;  and  has  also  published  an  account  of  a 
case    in   which    trickery   was    actually   detected    in    the 


360  DEATH 

process  of  operation — a  personal  incident.  (See  Pro- 
ceedings of  the  Ainerican  S.P.R.,  vol.  ii.,  pp.  10—13.)  But 
there  seem  to  be  certain  cases  on  record  that  are 
most  difficult  to  account  for  by  any  theory  of  trickery — 
partly  because  of  the  excellence  of  the  conditions,  and 
partly  because  of  the  character  of  the  experimenter. 
Let  us  glance  at  one  or  two  of  the  cases  in  which  the 
character  of  the  experimenter  would  seem  to  insure  the 
fact  that  no  conscious  and  voluntary  fraud  was  practised. 
A  resume  of  a  few  such  cases  is  to  be  found  in  Mr. 
Edward  T.  Bennett's  book  on  Spiritualism  (T.  C.  &  E.  C. 
Jack,  Edinburgh),  pp.  113-20.     We  quote  in  part: — 

"  The  most  notable  exception  to  this  (rule  of  fraud)  which  I 
am  able  to  quote  is  that  of  the  late  Mr.  J.  Traill  Taylor,  who 
was  for  a  considerable  time  the  editor  of  the  British  Journal  of 
Phot()(jra2)Jiy .  The  following  quotations  are  from  a  paper  on 
*  Spirit  Photography '  by  Mr.  Taylor.  It  was  originally  read 
before  the  London  and  Provincial  Photographic  Association  in 
March  1893,  and  was  reprinted  in  the  British  Journal  of  Photog- 
raphy for  March  2Gth,  1904,  shortly  after  Mr.  Taylor's  death. 
He  says  : — 

" '  Spirit  photography,  so  called,  has  of  late  been  asserting  its 
existence  in  such  a  manner  and  to  such  an  extent  as  to  warrant 
competent  men  in  making  an  investigation,  conducted  under 
stringent  test  conditions,  into  the  circumstances  under  which 
such  photographs  are  produced,  and  exposing  the  fraud  should 
it  prove  to  be  such,  instead  of  pooh-poohing  it  as  insensate 
because  we  do  not  understand  how  it  can  be  otherwise — a 
position  that  scarcely  commends  itself  as  intelligent  or  philo- 
sophical. If,  in  what  follows,  I  call  it  "spirit  photography," 
instead  of  psychic  photography,  it  is  only  in  deference  to  a 
nomenclature  that  extensively  prevails.  ...  I  approach  the 
subject  merely  as  a  photographer.' 

"  Mr.  Taylor  then  gives  a  history  of  the  earlier  manifesta- 
tions of  spirit  photography,  and  goes  on  to  explain  how 
striking  phenomena  in  photographing  what  is  invisible  to  the 


PHOTOGRAPHING  &  WEIGHING  THE  SOUL     361 

eye  may  be  produced  by  the  agency  of  florescence.  He  quotes 
the  demonstration  of  Dr.  Gladstone,  F.R.S.,  at  the  Bradford 
meeting  of  the  British  Association  in  1873,  showing  that 
invisible  drawings  on  white  cards  have  produced  bold  and  clear 
photographs  when  no  eye  could  see  the  drawings  themselves. 
Hence,  as  Mr.  Taylor  says :  '  The  photographing  of  an  invisible 
image  is  not  scientifically  impossible.' 

*'  Mr.  Taylor  then  proceeds  to  describe  some  personal 
experiments.  He  says  :  '  For  several  years  I  have  experienced 
a  strong  desire  to  ascertain  by  personal  investigation  the 
amount  of  truth  in  the  ever-recurring  allegation  that  figures, 
other  than  those  visually  present  in  the  room,  appeared  on  the 
sensitive  plate.  .  .  .  Mr.  D.,  of  Glasgow,  in  whose  presence 
psychic  photographs  have  long  been  alleged  to  be  obtained,  was 
lately  in  London  on  a  visit,  and  a  mutual  friend  got  him  to  consent 
to  extend  his  stay  in  order  that  I  might  try  to  get  a  psychic  photo- 
graph under  test  conditions.  To  this  he  willingly  agreed.  My 
conditions  were  exceedingly  simple,  were  courteously  expressed 
to  the  host,  and  entirely  acquiesced  in.  They  were  that  I,  for 
the  nonce,  would  assume  them  all  to  be  tricksters,  and,  to  guard 
against  fraud,  should  use  my  own  camera  and  unopened  packages 
of  dry  plates  purchased  from  dealers  of  repute,  and  that  I  should 
be  excused  from  allowing  a  plate  to  go  out  of  my  own  hand  till 
after  development,  unless  I  felt  otherwise  disposed  ;  but  that  as 
I  was  to  treat  them  as  under  suspicion,  so  must  they  treat  me, 
and  that  every  act  I  performed  must  be  in  the  presence  of  two 
witnesses ;  nay,  that  I  would  set  a  watch  upon  my  own  camera  in 
the  guise  of  a  duplicate  one  of  the  same  focus — in  other  words, 
I  would  use  a  binocular  stereoscopic  camera  and  dictate  all  the 
conditions  of  operation.  .  .   . 

''  '  Dr.  G.  was  the  first  sitter,  and,  for  a  reason  known  to 
myself,  I  used  a  monocular  camera.  I  myself  took  the  plate 
out  of  a  packet  just  previously  ripped  up,  under  the  surveillance 
of  my  two  detectives.  I  placed  the  slide  in  my  pocket  and 
exposed  it  by  magnesium  ribbon  which  I  held  in  my  own  hand, 
keeping  one  eye,  as  it  were,  on  the  sitter,  and  the  other  on  the 
camera.  There  was  no  background.  I  myself  took  the  plate 
from  the  dark  slide,  and,  under  the  eyes  of  the  two  detectives, 


362  DEATH 

placed  it  in  the  developing  dish.  Between  the  camera  and  the 
sitter  a  female  figure  was  developed,  rather  in  a  more  pronounced 
form  than  that  of  the  sitter.  ...  I  submit  this  picture.  ...  I 
do  not  recognise  her,  or  any  of  the  other  figures  I  obtained,  as 
like  any  one  I  know.   .   .   . 

"  '  Many  experiments  of  like  nature  followed  ;  on  some  plates 
were  abnormal  appearances,  on  others  none.  All  this  time  Mr. 
D.,  the  medium,  during  the  exposure  of  the  plates,  was  quite 
inactive.   .   .  . 

" '  The  psychic  figures  behaved  badly.  Some  were  in  focus, 
others  not  so.  Some  were  lighted  from  the  right,  while  the 
sitter  was  so  from  the  left ;  some  were  comely  .  .  .  others  not 
so.  Some  monopolised  the  major  portion  of  the  plate,  quite 
obliterating  the  material  sitters.  .  .  .  But  here  is  the  point : 
Not  one  of  these  figures  which  came  out  so  strongly  in  the 
negative  was  visible  in  any  form  or  shape  to  me  during  the 
time  of  exposure  in  the  camera,  and  I  vouch  in  the  strongest 
manner  for  the  fact  that  no  one  whatever  had  an  opportunity  of 
tampering  with  any  plate  anterior  to  its  being  placed  in  the 
dark  slide  or  immediately  preceding  development.  Pictorially 
they  are  vile,  but  how  came  they  there  ? 

"  '  Now,  all  this  time  I  imagine  you  are  wondering  how  the 
stereoscopic  camera  was  behaving  itself  as  such.  It  is  due 
to  the  psychic  entities  to  say  that  whatever  was  produced  on 
one-half  of  the  stereoscopic  plates  was  produced  on  the  other — 
alike  good  or  bad  in  definition.  But,  on  a  careful  examination 
of  one  which  was  rather  better  than  the  other  ...  I  deduce 
this  fact,  that  the  impressing  of  the  spirit  form  was  not 
simultaneous  with  that  of  the  sitter.  .  .  .  This  I  consider  an 
important  discovery.  I  carefully  examined  one  in  the  stereo- 
scope and  found  that,  while  the  two  sitters  were  stereoscopic 
per  se,  the  psychic  figure  was  absolutely  ./?a^/  I  also  found  that 
the  psychic  figure  was  at  least  a  millimetre  higher  up  in  one 
than  in  the  other.  Now,  as  both  had  been  simultaneously 
exposed,  it  follows  to  demonstration  that,  although  both  were 
correctly  placed,  vertically  in  relation  to  the  particular  sitter, 
behind  whom  the  figure  appeared,  and  not  so  horizontally,  this 
figure   had  not  only  not  been  impressed  on  the  plate   simul- 


PHOTOGRAPHING  &  WEIGHING  THE  SOUL    363 

taneously  with  the  two  gentlemen  forming  the  group,  but  had 
not  been  formed  by  the  lens  at  all,  and  that,  therefore,  the 
psychic  image  might  be  produced  without  a  camera.  I  think 
this  is  a  fair  deduction.  But  still  the  question  obtrudes  :  How 
came  these  figures  there  ?  I  again  assert  that  the  plates  were 
not  tampered  with  by  either  myself  or  any  one  present.  Are 
they  crystallisations  of  thought?  Have  lens  and  light  really 
nothing  to  do  with  their  formation  ?  The  whole  subject  was 
mysterious  enough  on  the  hypothesis  of  an  invisible  spirit — 
whether  a  thought  projection  or  an  actual  spirit,  being  really 
there  in  the  vicinity  of  the  sitter — but  it  is  now  a  thousand  times 
more  so.  .   .  . 

"  '  In  the  foregoing  I  have  confined  myself  as  closely  as  possible 
to  narrating  how  I  conducted  a  photographic  experiment  open  to 
every  one  to  make,  avoiding  stating  any  hypothesis  or  belief  of 
my  own  on  the  subject.'  " 

A  remarkable  series  of  experiments  has  been  reported 
by  Mr.  J.  Godfrey  Raupert  in  his  book,  The  Bankers  of 
Spiritualism  (Kegan  Paul  &  Co.).  His  conclusions  are 
certainly  entitled  to  due  weight  and  consideration — 
coming,  as  they  do,  from  so  careful  an  investigator. 
Personal  interviews  with  Mr.  Raupert  but  served  to 
strengthen  our  faith  in  his  conclusions.  His  account 
runs  as  follows  : — 

"  The  ordinary  methods  of  spirit  photography  give  an  oppor- 
tunity for  so  much  trickery  that  the  most  conservative  psychical 
researchers  seem  doubtful  whether  authentic  results  can  be 
attained  at  all.  In  this  connection,  therefore,  it  is  interesting 
to  note  that  I  claim  to  have  succeeded  in  getting  such  photo- 
graphs under  what,  to  me  at  least,  are  satisfactory  '  test ' 
conditions. 

"  In  the  course  of  my  inquiries  I  came  across  a  professional 
photographer  who  thoroughly  believed  in  psychic  photography, 
and  who  maintained  that  he  had  obtained  genuine  pictures.  He 
had,  of  course,  suffered  a  good  deal  on  this  account  at  the  hands 
of  a  sceptical  public  and  of  a  certain  class  of  psychical  researchei's, 


364  DEATH 

who  appear  to  think  that  they  are  the  only  honest  people  in  the 
world. 

*'  There  seemed,  in  the  case  of  my  new  friend,  no  moral  objection 
to  the  experiment.  He  had  obtained  the  pictures  in  question  in 
his  studio  in  broad  daylight  and  under  perfectly  normal  conditions. 
He  had  no  need  of  a  '  circle '  or  '  stance,'  and  his  time  of  exposure 
was  no  more  than  the  time  allowed  for  ordinary  pictures.  He 
declared,  moreover,  that  he  was  not  conscious  of  any  loss  of  vital 
power  or  nervous  energy  in  connection  with  the  process  :  that 
he  could  eat  and  sleep  well,  and  that  his  health  was  normal. 
He  had  become  convinced  that  the  mysterious  photographs  were 
produced  by  intelligences  external  to,  and  independent  of,  the 
operator,  but  that  they  were  in  some  inexplicable  way  connected 
with  his  own  physical  or  psychical  personality.  After  many 
visits  to  his  studio,  I  succeeded  in  thoroughly  gaining  his  con- 
fidence so  that  I  found  him  ready  to  agree  to  any  experiments 
I  might  propose.  He  assented  to  my  bringing  my  own  marked 
plates,  placed  beforehand  in  the  dark  shutter ;  to  my  taking 
any  attitude  I  liked  in  front  of  the  camera,  and  to  my  watching 
the  entire  process  of  developing  in  his  dark  room.  It  thus 
became  my  habit  to  go  to  his  studio  at  all  odd  times,  often 
dropping  in  for  a  chat  quite  unexpectedly,  and  then  proposing 
to  sit  for  a  picture.  It  was  but  seldom  that  he  raised  any 
objection  to  an  experiment  thus  suggested.  When  he  did  so,  it 
was  generally  on  account  of  his  health.  Experience  had  taught 
him  that  indisposition,  mental  or  physical,  interfered  with  his 
success. 

"The  plates  obtained  under  these  conditions  invariably  dis- 
closed a  vague,  cloud-like  formation  hovering  near  my  own 
person,  and  sometimes  showed  distinct  outlines  of  a  form.  In 
one  or  two  instances  features  would  become  distinctly  visible  in 
this  cloud-like  emanation  on  the  third  or  fourth  plate — the  very 
gradualness  of  the  development  of  the  form  seeming  to  me  to 
tell  in  favour  of  the  genuineness  of  the  pictures.  I  have  thus 
obtained  an  infinite  variety  of  pictures  on  plates  prepared  by 
myself  and  remaining  under  my  constant  observation  to  the  last. 
Some  of  them  are  extremely  interesting  and  have  quite  a  history 
of  their  own  ;  but  they  are  all  photographically  of  much  the 


PHOTOGRAPHING  &  AVEIGHING  THE  SOUL    365 

same  value.  Experienced  photographers  who  have  seen  them 
maintain  that  they  could  be  produced  normally,  although  they 
also  admit  that  this  could  not  possibly  be  done  under  the 
conditions  stated. 

"Finding  myself  one  winter's  morning  unexpectedly  near  the 
studio  in  question,  I  felt  tempted  to  look  in  and  have  a  talk 
about  psychical  matters.  I  found  my  photographer  friend 
busily  engaged  with  his  ordinary  work,  but  evidently  pleased 
to  see  me.  We  talked  a  good  deal  about  'fresh  tests,'  '  favour- 
able conditions,'  and  '  evidence,'  and  we  agreed  as  to  the 
difficulties  which  stood  in  the  way  of  obtaining  the  latter. 
He  thought  that  photographically  the  evidence  was  as  perfect 
as  it  was  ever  likely  to  be,  but  that  our  greatest  difficulties 
were  due  to  our  ignorance  of  the  laws  which  govern  the 
phenomena.  I  expressed  it  as  my  opinion  that  good  evidence 
would  have  to  be  sought  for  in  a  different  direction  altogether, 
since  I  had  come  to  see  that  it  could  never  photographically 
be  of  such  a  character  as  to  carry  conviction  to  any  outside 
mind. 

"Putting  on  my  hat  and  opening  the  door,  I  was  on  the 
point  of  leaving  the  studio  when  the  thought  occurred  to  me  to 
make  an  experiment  on  the  spur  of  the  moment.  My  friend 
consented  at  once.  As  I  had  no  marked  plates  with  me,  I  felt 
that  we  could  not  under  any  circumstances  create  'test' 
conditions.  He  put  two  of  his  own  plates  into  a  dark  shutter, 
left  me  to  arrange  myself  in  front  of  the  camera,  and  made  an 
exposure  in  the  ordinary  way.  The  result  was  a  figure,  the 
face  and  upper  part  of  which  would  seem  to  be  those  of  a 
woman  shrouded  in  '  psychic '  drapery.  I  could  not  recognise 
the  features  as  those  of  any  person  I  had  known,  although  they 
seemed  familiar  to  me,  and  I  expressed  my  regret  at  the 
circumstance.  At  that  moment  there  flashed  across  my 
memory  the  details  of  a  statement  which  had  some  months 
before  been  made  in  my  presence,  and  which  was  to  the  effect 
that  these  psychic  figures  in  all  probability  possessed  the 
power  of  assuming  any  form,  and  that  the  drapery  was 
probably  only  adopted  because  it  facilitated  the  shaping  of 
some  kind  of  body,  and  because  it  involved  the  least  amount 


366  DEATH 

of  expenditure  of  force.     Assuming,  therefore,  the  presence  of 
an  intelligent  being  which  could  hear  and  see  me,  I  exclaimed  : — 

"'I  cannot  recognise  you  in  the  drapery  which  you  have 
assumed  in  this  picture :  but  I  might  do  so  if  I  were  to  see 
you  in  the  dress  you  last  wore  in  your  earth  life,  I  am  told 
that  it  is  merely  a  question  of  memory,  and  that  you  can 
change  your  appearance.  Try  and  think  of  what  you  were  and 
looked  like  before  you  passed  out  of  this  life,  and  we  will  make 
another  exposure.' 

"  The  photographer  smiled  at  the  boldness  of  the  experiment, 
but  I  took  my  place  again  before  the  camera.  He  exposed  the 
second  plate.  I  have  not  been  able  to  identify  the  result,  but 
it  was  all  that  could  be  desired.  The  question  was,  Is  the 
face  on  the  second  plate  that  of  the  first  plate  ?  \Ye  examined 
the  faces  very  closely  as  soon  as  we  had  printed  the  pictures, 
and  the  magnifying  glass  certainly  disclosed  a  very  striking 
likeness.  But  the  predisposed  mind,  I  have  reason  to  know,  is 
no  very  reliable  judge.  We  are  very  apt  to  see  what  we  wish 
to  see.  I  have  consequently  submitted  the  pictures  to  what  I 
believe  to  be  the  highest  authority  on  this  subject  in  England, 
requesting  that  no  pains  might  be  spared  to  discover  the  truth, 
with  the  result  that  the  faces  were  pronounced  to  be  identical." 
(The  pictures  referred  to  in  this  connection  are  reproduced  in 
Mr.  Raupert's  book.) 

"  It  will  be  seen  that  the  evidence  in  favour  of  the  genuine- 
ness of  these  pictures,  whatever  their  origin,  is  very  strong,  and 
that  it  is  quite  independent  of  anything  that  might  be  urged 
from  the  photographic  point  of  view.  Any  other  theory  clearly 
involves  difficulties  which,  to  say  the  least,  make  it  infinitely  more 
cumbrous  and  incredible.  If  will  be  remembered  that  I  had  no 
appointment  with  the  photographer,  and  that  I  had  myself  no 
intention  of  making  any  experiment.  The  first  photograph  was 
taken  entirely  on  the  spur  of  the  moment,  and  it  was  only  after 
I  had  obtained  it  that  the  thought  of  suggesting  the  transforma- 
tion entered  my  mind.  I  do  not  know  what  modern  photography 
is  able  to  accomplish,  but  I  do  know  that  the  most  ingenious 
photographer  cannot  prepare  for  an  experiment  which  the 
experimenter    himself    has    not    even    contemplated    when   he 


PHOTOGRAPHING  &  WEIGHING  THE  SOUL    367 

sets  to   work,  and  which   is   only  suggested    to   his   mind    by 
what  occurs  in  the  process. 

"It  is  clear  that  in  this  instance  the  solution  of  the  problem 
must  be  sought  for  elsewhere,  and  that  the  evidence  in  favour 
of  the  action  of  abnormal  agencies  is  exceptionally  strong.  It 
increases  in  force  when  other  important  circumstances,  such  as 
the  appearance  of  the  forms  on  marked  and  observed  plates,  the 
curious  cloud-like  formations,  and  other  things  are  borne  in 
mind.  It  does  not  necessarily  follow,  of  course,  that  these 
forms,  because  they  are  genuine,  are  actually  representations 
of  the  dead.  That  is  a  different  question  altogether.  All  I 
claim  is  that  the  plates  disclose  the  existence  of  a  certain  force 
or  matter  at  present  not  known  to  a  great  many  scientists,  and 
the  existence  of  an  intelligence,  or  intelligences,  other  than 
those  of  the  operators  that  are  capable,  under  certain  conditions, 
of  causing  that  force  or  matter  to  assume  certain  forms.  This, 
to  my  mind,  is  an  undeniable  fact,  which  can  be  ascertained  by 
any  person  who  chooses  to  investigate  carefully  and  patiently, 
and  who  is  prepared  to  expend  upon  this  great  problem  of 
human  life  as  much  time  and  interest  as  men  expend  upon  the 
examination  of  a  new  species  of  useless  fish  or  of  a  new  lump 
of  shining  dirt." 

Having  thus  cleared  the  ground,  so  to  speak,  let  us 
now  consider  the  more  startling  statements  and  experi- 
ments by  Dr.  Baraduc,  summarised  by  him  in  his  Avork, 
Mes  Morts;  leurs  Manifestations,  &c.  (1908).  A  brief 
resume  of  this  book  cannot  fail  to  be  of  interest,  since 
the  events  he  records  naturally  lead  up  to  the  experiments 
in  photography  recorded  at  its  end. 

At  a  quarter-past  nine,  on  a  certain  memorable  day  in 
April  1907,  died  Andre  M.  Joseph  Baraduc,  at  the  age  of 
nineteen  years.  Throughout  his  life  there  had  been  a 
close  bond  of  affection  between  himself  and  his  father, 
and  we  are  assured  that  during  the  lifetime  of  the  son, 
telepathic  communication    had    been    frequent    between 


368  DEATH 

them.  When  he  was  but  nineteen  it  was  discovered  that 
Andre  was  suffering  from  that  dread  disease,  consumption; 
and  henceforward  he  grew  rapidly  worse,  dying  within 
the  year.  Toward  the  close  of  this  year  he  made  two 
visits  to  Lourdes,  without,  however,  receiving  much 
benefit  in  either  case,  and  returning  apparently  without 
augmented  faith  in  the  cures  brought  about  at  that 
centre.  Andre  was  exceedingly  religious  in  tempera- 
ment, as  was  his  father,  and  both  were  given  to 
experiments  in  psychic  research.  We  are  informed 
that,  during  the  lifetime  of  the  son,  his  "  astral "  form 
had  been  experimentally  separated  from  his  bodily 
frame  on  more  than  one  occasion.  It  was  only 
natural  to  suppose,  therefore,  that,  at  the  death  of 
this  favourite  son,  the  father's  grief  should  be  so 
intense  that  the  emotional  reflex  found  expression  in 
various  visions  and  apparent  conversations  with  the 
dead  boy.  For  within  six  hours  after  the  death  of 
Andre,  the  son  appeared  to  his  father,  and  thence- 
forth many  apparitions  were  seen,  and  several  long 
conversations  were  apparently  held  between  father  and 
son.  Of  course,  these  in  themselves  would,  under  the 
circumstances,  have  no  evidential  value,  since  it  is  only 
natural  to  suppose  that  hallucinations,  both  of  sight  and 
hearing,  would  result  in  a  mind  so  wrought. 

These  subjective  and  apparently  telepathic  experiences 
of  Dr.  Baraduc  cannot,  therefore,  be  considered  of  value ; 
but  the  objective  experiences — that  is  to  say,  the  experi- 
ments performed  by  him  are  of  great  interest,  since  one 
can  hardly  suppose  that  the  camera  can  be  hallucinated, 
because  of  the  grief  of  the  photographer !  The  impres- 
sions left  upon  the  plates,  then,  such  as  they  are, 
have  their  evidential  and  scientific  value,  and  it  is  to 
a  consideration  of  these  photographs  that  we  now  turn. 

Nine  hours  after  the  death  of  Andr^,  Dr.  Baraduc  took 


PHOTOGRAPHING  &  WEIGHING  THE  SOUL     369 

the  first  photograph  of  the  coffin  in  which  the  body  was 
deposited.  When  this  plate  was  developed,  it  was  dis- 
covered that,  emanating  from  the  coffin,  was  a  formless, 
misty,  wave-like  mass,  radiating  in  all  directions  with 
considerable  force,  impinging  upon  the  bodies  of  those 
who  came  into  close  proximity  to  the  coffin,  as  though 
attracted  to  them  by  some  magnetic  force.  On  one 
occasion,  indeed,  the  force  of  this  projected  fluidic 
emanation  was  so  great  that  Dr.  Baraduc  received  an 
electric  shock  from  head  to  foot,  which  produced  a 
temporary  vertigo.  On  studying  the  photograph,  it 
will  be  seen  that  there  emerge  from  the  body  dark, 
tree-shaped  emanations,  issuing  in  formal  lines,  which 
gradually  diverge,  and  become  more  and  more  attenuated 
and  misty  as  they  recede  further  and  further  from  the 
body.  Although  this  photograph  does  not  in  itself 
prove  anything  supernormal,  it  is  highly  suggestive, 
and  it  aroused  Dr.  Baraduc's  interest  in  the  subject, 
and  enabled  him  to  pursue  his  more  conclusive  ex- 
periments immediately  upon  the  death  of  his  wife. 

Six  months  after  the  death  of  Andre,  Nadine,  Dr. 
Baraduc's  wife  and  the  mother  of  Andre,  passed  quietly 
away,  giving  vent,  at  the  moment  of  her  death,  to  three 
gentle  sighs.  Remembering  the  result  of  the  former 
experiments  (photographing  the  body  of  Andre  shortly 
after  his  death),.  Dr.  Baraduc  had  prepared  a  camera  beside 
the  bed  of  his  wife,  and,  at  the  moment  of  her  death, 
photographed  the  body,  and  shortly  after  developed  the 
plate.  Upon  it  were  found  three  luminous  globes  resting 
a  few  inches  above  the  body.  These  gradually  condensed 
and  became  more  brilliant.  Streaks  of  light,  like  fine 
threads,  were  also  seen  darting  hither  and  thither.  A 
quarter  of  an  hour  after  the  death  of  his  wife.  Dr.  Baraduc 
took  another  photograph.  Fluid  cords  were  seen  to  have 
developed,  partly  encircling   these   globes   of  light.     At 

2a 


370  DEATH 

three  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  or  an  hour  after  her  death, 
another  photograph  was  taken.  It  will  he  seen  from  this 
photograph  that  the  three  globes  of  light  have  condensed 
and  coalesced  into  one,  obscuring  the  head  of  Madame 
Baraduc,  and  developing  towards  the  right.  Cords  were 
formed  in  the  shape  of  a  figure  eight,  closed  at  the  top, 
and  opened  at  the  point  nearest  the  body.  Thus,  as  the 
globe  develops  in  one  direction,  the  cords  seem  to  become 
more  tense,  and  pull  in  the  opposite  direction.  The 
separation  becomes  more  and  more  complete,  until  finally, 
three  and  a  half  hours  after  death,  a  well-formed  globe 
rested  above  the  body,  apparently  held  together  by  the 
encircling,  luminous  cords,  which  seemed  also  to  guide 
and  control  it.  At  this  moment,  the  globe  becomes  sepa- 
rated from  the  body,  and,  guided  by  the  cords,  floats  into 
Dr.  Baraduc's  bedroom.  He  speaks  to  the  globe  intensely; 
the  globe  thereupon  approaches  him,  and  he  feels  an  icy 
cold  breeze,  which  seems  to  surround  and  issue  from  the 
ball  of  light. 

Frequently,  within  the  next  few  days  after  these  experi- 
ments, Dr.  Baraduc  saw  similar  globes  in  various  parts  of 
the  house.  By  means  of  automatic  writing,  obtained 
through  the  hand  of  a  non  -  professional  psychic,  he 
succeeded  at  last  in  establishing  communication  with  this 
luminous  ball,  and  was  informed  that  it  w^as  the  encase- 
ment of  Madame  Baraduc's  soul,  which  was  still  active 
and  alive  within  it !  It  was  asserted  that,  as  the  days 
progressed,  the  encircling  cords  were  one  by  one  snapped, 
and  that  the  spirit  more  nearly  assumed  the  astral  body 
facsimile  of  the  earthly  body.  Andre,  however,  was  seen 
by  him  to  be  a  completely  developed  astral  body;  and 
his  wife  asserted  that  she  too  would  shortly  take  her 
place  beside  Andre  in  her  permanent  form.  As  further 
photographs  were  not  developed,  however,  there  is  no 
experimental  evidence  confirming  these  statements. 


PHOTOGRAPHING  &  WEIGHING  THE  SOUL    371 

Although  these  initial  experiments  of  Dr.  Baraduc 
cannot,  of  themselves,  be  considered  conclusive,  they  are 
nevertheless  highly  interesting,  and  should  lead  to  further 
research  in  the  same  direction.  The  evidence  afforded  by 
apparitions,  single  and  collective ;  by  haunted  houses ;  the 
indirect  testimony  afforded  by  the  apparent  psychic  per- 
ception by  animals  ;  the  evidence,  such  as  it  is,  for  "  spirit 
photography";  the  recent  experiments  in  thought-photo- 
graphy, and  the  photographs  made  at  the  seances  of 
Eusapia  Palladino,  all  tend  to  confirm,  it  seems  to  us,  the 
conclusions  arrived  at  by  Dr.  Baraduc,  as  the  result  of  his 
preliminary  researches.  If  an  astral  body  of  some  sort 
exists,  it  must  occupy  space ;  and,  being  space-occupying, 
must,  a  priori,  be  material  enough  to  occupy  it !  Whether 
or  not  this  material  is  sufficiently  solid  to  reflect  light 
waves,  and  make  an  impression  upon  the  sensitive  plate 
of  the  camera,  is  an  aspect  of  the  problem  still  open  to 
debate.  Certainly,  there  can  be  no  longer  any  a  'priori 
objection  to  such  an  hypothesis.  The  recent  discoveries 
in  physics,  the  experiments  in  photography,  by  means  of 
the  X-rays,  ultra-violet  light,  and  the  "black-light"  of 
Dr.  Le  Bon,  all  serve  to  indicate  that  it  is  possible  to 
photograph  thousands  of  objects  invisible  to  the  naked 
eye.  Indeed,  this  is  well  known,  for,  as  before  stated, 
while  the  naked  eye  can  see  but  a  few  thousand  stars 
in  the  heavens,  the  photographic  plate  is  capable  of 
receiving  impressions  from  some  twenty  millions. 

Further  indirect  testimony  is  afforded  by  the  state- 
ments of  clairvoyants,  and  by  the  direct  testimony  (taking 
it  for  what  it  is  worth)  of  so-called  "  spirits  "  who  com- 
municate their  sensations  and  the  knowledge  they  have 
gained  after  bodily  death.  They  invariably  assert  that 
there  is  an  astral  facsimile,  or  spiritual  replica,  of  the 
physical  body.  Repellent  as  the  idea  may  be  to  some  of  a 
semi- material,  space-occupying  soul,  the  facts  would  seem 


372  DEATH 

to  indicate  that  such  is  true.  Yet  there  might  be  a  way 
out  of  the  difficulty,  since  we  might  still  suppose  that  the 
soul,  or  seat  of  consciousness,  exists  as  a  point  of  force 
within  this  spiritual  organism.  Whichever  theory  is 
ultimately  proved  correct  cannot,  of  course,  be  settled  by 
a  'priori  speculation,  but  by  facts  ;  and  such  experiments 
as  those  conducted  by  Dr.  Baraduc  in  photographing  the 
soul  are,  perhaps,  the  best  line  of  investigation  to  follow, 
and  one  from  which,  with  the  improvements  in  photog- 
raphy, most  is  to  be  hoped. 


2.  Experiments  in  Weighing  the  Soul. 

Some  time  ago  great  interest  was  aroused  by  the 
publication  of  certain  reports  of  experiments  in  weighing 
the  soul — the  body  of  a  man  being  weighed  just  before 
and  just  after  death — it  being  found  that  there  was  a 
considerable  loss  in  weight  just  after  the  death  of  the 
patient,  not  accounted  for  by  any  of  the  known  channels 
of  loss.  When  these  reports  were  published,  the  American 
Society  for  Psychical  Research  obtained  all  the  original 
documents  and  correspondence  concerning  these  tests,  and 
printed  them  in  full  in  the  June,  1907,  issue  of  its  Journal. 
Any  one  desiring  the  full  and  authentic  account  of  these 
facts  will  find  it  there.  Dr.  Duncan  MacDougall  also 
wrote  a  special  article  describing  his  experiments,  and 
from  this  we  quote  the  following : — ■ 

"  According  to  the  latest  conception  of  science,  substance  or 
space-occupying  material  is  divisible  into  that  which  is  gravi- 
tative — solids,  liquids,  gases,  all  having  weight — and  the  ether 
which  is  non-gravitative.  It  seemed  impossible  to  me  that  the 
soul  substance  could  consist  of  ether.  If  the  conception  be  true 
that  ether  is  continuous  and  not  to  be  conceived  of  as  existing  or 
capable  of  existing  in  separate  masses,  we  have  here  the  most 


PHOTOGRAPHING  &  WEIGHING  THE  SOUL    373 

solid  ground  for  believing  that  the  soul  substance  we  are  seeking 
is  not  ether,  because  one  of  the  very  first  attributes  of  personal 
identity  is  the  quality  or  condition  of  separateness.  Nothing  is 
more  borne  in  upon  consciousness,  than  that  the  you  in  you,  and 
the  me  in  me,  the  ego,  is  detached  and  separate  from  all  things 
else — the  non-ego. 

"  We  are  therefore  driven  back  upon  the  assumption  that  the 
soul  substance  so  necessary  to  the  conception  of  continuing  per- 
sonal identity,  after  the  death  of  this  material  body,  must  still 
be  a  form  of  gravitative  matter,  or  perhaps  a  middle  form  of 
substance  neither  gravitative  matter  nor  ether,  not  capable  of 
being  weighed,  and  yet  not  identical  with  ether.  Since,  how- 
ever, the  substance  considered  in  our  hypothesis  must  be  linked 
organically  with  the  body  until  death  takes  place,  it  appears  to 
me  more  reasonable  to  think  that  it  must  be  some  form  of  gravi- 
tative matter,  and  therefore  capable  of  being  detected  at  death 
by  weighing  a  human  being  in  the  act  of  death. 

"The  subjects  experimented  upon  all  gave  their  consent  to 
the  experiment  weeks  before  the  day  of  death.  The  experiments 
did  not  subject  the  patients  to  any  additional  suffering. 

"  My  first  subject  was  a  man  dying  of  tuberculosis.  It  seemed 
to  me  best  to  select  a  patient  dying  with  a  disease  that  produces 
great  exhaustion,  the  death  occurring  with  little  or  no  muscular 
movement,  because  in  such  a  case  the  beam  could  be  kept  more 
perfectly  at  balance  and  any  loss  occurring  readily  noted. 

"The  patient  was  under  observation  for  three  hours  and  forty 
minutes  before  death,  lying  on  a  bed  arranged  on  a  light  frame 
work  built  upon  very  delicately  balanced  platform  beam  scales. 
The  patient's  comfort  was  looked  after  in  every  way,  although  he 
was  practically  moribund  when  placed  upon  the  bed.  He  lost 
weight  slowly  at  the  rate  of  one  ounce  per  hour,  due  to  evapora- 
tion of  moisture  in  respiration  and  evaporation  of  sweat. 

"  During  all  three  hours  and  forty  minutes  I  kept  the  beam 
end  slightly  above  balance  near  the  upper  limiting  bar  in  order 
to  make  the  test  more  decisive  if  it  should  come. 

"  At  the  end  of  three  hours  and  forty  minutes  he  expired, 
and  suddenly  coincident  with  death  the  beam  end  dropped  with 
an  audible  stroke,  hitting  against  the  lower  limiting  bar  and 


374  DEATH 

remaining  there  with  no  rebound.      The  loss  was   ascertained 
to  be  three-fourths  of  an  ounce. 

"  This  loss  of  weight  could  not  be  due  to  evaporation  of  respira- 
tory moisture  and  sweat,  because  that  had  already  been  deter- 
mined to  go  on,  in  his  case,  at  the  rate  of  one-sixtieth  of  an 
ounce  per  minute,  whereas  this  loss  was  sudden  and  large,  three- 
fourths  of  an  ounce  in  a  few  seconds. 

"The  bowels  did  not  move;  if  they  had  moved,  the  weight 
would  still  have  remained  upon  the  bed  except  for  a  slow  loss 
by  the  evaporation  of  moisture  depending,  of  course,  upon  the 
fluidity  of  the  fseces.  The  bladder  evacuated  one  or  two  drachms 
of  urine.  This  remained  upon  the  bed,  and  could  only  have 
influenced  the  weight  by  slow  gradual  evaporation,  and  there- 
fore in  no  way  could  account  for  the  sudden  loss. 

"  There  remained  but  one  more  channel  of  loss  to  explore,  the 
expiration  of  all  but  the  residual  air  in  the  lungs.  Getting  upon 
the  bed  myself,  my  colleague  put  the  beam  at  actual  balance. 
Inspiration  and  expiration  of  air  as  forcibly  as  possible  by  me 
had  no  effect  upon  the  beam.  My  colleague  got  upon  the  bed, 
and  I  placed  the  beam  at  balance.  Forcible  inspiration  and 
expiration  of  air  on  his  part  had  no  effect.  In  this  case  we 
certainly  have  an  inexplicable  loss  of  weight  of  three-fourths 
of  an  ounce.  Is  it  the  soul  substance  ?  How  else  shall  we 
explain  it  ? 

"  My  second  patient  was  a  man  moribund  from  consumption. 
He  was  on  the  bed  about  four  hours  and  fifteen  minutes  under 
observation  before  death.  The  first  four  hours  he  lost  weight  at 
the  rate  of  three-fourths  of  an  ounce  per  hour.  He  had  much 
slower  respiration  than  the  first  case,  which  accounted  for  the 
difference  in  loss  of  weight  from  evaporation  and  respiratory 
moisture. 

''  The  last  fifteen  minutes  he  had  ceased  to  breathe,  but  his 
facial  muscles  still  moved  convulsively,  and  then,  coinciding 
with  the  last  movement  of  the  facial  muscle,  the  beam  dropped. 
The  weight  lost  was  found  to  be  half -an -ounce.  Then  my 
colleague  auscultated  the  heart  and  found  it  stopped.  I  tried 
again,  and  the  loss  was  one  ounce  and  a  half  and  fifty  grains. 
In  the  eighteen  minutes  that  elapsed  between  the  time  he  ceased 


PHOTOGRAPHING  &  WEIGHING  THE  SOUL    375 

breathing  until  we  were  certain  of  death,  there  was  a  weight  loss 
of  one  and  one-half  ounces  and  fifty  grains,  compared  with  a  loss 
of  three  ounces  during  a  period  of  four  hours  during  which  time 
the  ordinary  channels  of  loss  were  at  work.  No  bowel  move- 
ment took  place.  The  bladder  moved,  but  the  urine  remained 
upon  the  bed,  and  could  not  have  evaporated  enough  through 
the  thick  bed  clothing  to  have  influenced  the  result. 

"The  beam  at  the  end  of  eighteen  minutes  of  doubt  was 
placed  again  with  the  end  in  slight  contact  with  the  upper  bar 
and  watched  for  forty  minutes,  but  no  further  loss  took  place. 

"  My  scales  were  sensitive  to  two-tenths  of  an  ounce.  If 
placed  at  balance,  one-tenth  of  an  ounce  would  lift  the  beam  up 
close  to  the  upper  limiting  bar,  another  one-tenth  ounce  would 
bring  it  up  and  keep  it  in  direct  contact,  then  if  the  two-tenths 
were  removed  the  beam  would  drop  to  the  lower  bar  and  then 
slowly  oscillate  till  balance  was  reached  again. 

"  This  patient  was  of  a  totally  different  temperament  from 
the  first ;  his  death  was  very  gradual,  so  that  we  had  great  doubt 
from  the  ordinary  evidence  to  say  just  what  moment  he  died. 

*'  My  third  case,  a  man  dying  of  tuberculosis,  showed  a  weight 
of  half-an-ounce  lost,  coincident  with  death,  and  an  additional 
loss  of  one  ounce  a  few  minutes  later. 

"  In  the  fourth  case,  a  woman  dying  of  diabetic  coma,  unfor- 
tunately our  scales  were  not  finely  adjusted,  and  there  was  a 
good  deal  of  interference  by  people  opposed  to  our  work,  and 
although  at  death  the  beam  sunk  so  that  it  required  from  three- 
eighths  to  one-half  ounce  to  bring  it  back  to  the  point  preceding 
death,  yet  I  regard  this  test  as  of  no  value. 

"  With  my  fifth  case,  a  man  dying  of  tuberculosis,  showed  a 
distinct  drop  in  the  beam  requiring  about  three-eighths  of  an 
ounce  which  could  not  be  accounted  for.  This  occurred  exactly 
simultaneously  with  death,  but  peculiarly,  on  bringing  the  beam 
up  again  with  weights  and  later  removing  them,  the  beam  did 
not  sink  back  to  stay  back  for  fully  fifteen  minutes.  It  was 
impossible  to  account  for  the  three-eighths  of  an  ounce  drop, 
it  was  so  sudden  and  distinct,  the  beam  hitting  the  lower  bar 
with  as  great  a  noise  as  in  the  first  case.  Our  scales  in  this  case 
were  very  sensitively  balanced. 


376  DEATH 

"  My  sixth  and  last  case  was  not  a  fair  test.  The  patient 
died  almost  within  five  minutes  after  being  placed  upon  the 
bed,  and  died  while  I  was  adjusting  the  beam. 

*'  The  net  result  of  the  experiments  conducted  on  human 
beings  is  that  a  loss  of  substance  occurs  at  death  not  accounted 
for  by  known  channels  of  loss.  Is  it  the  soul  substance  ?  It 
would  seem  to  me  to  be  so.  According  to  our  hypothesis  such 
a  substance  is  necessary  to  the  assumption  of  continuing  or 
persisting  personality  after  bodily  death,  and  here  we  have 
experimental  demonstration  that  a  substance  capable  of  being 
weighed  does  leave  the  human  body  at  death. 

"  If  this  substance  is  a  counterpart  of  the  physical  body,  has 
the  same  bulk,  occupies  the  same  dimensions  in  space,  then  it  is 
a  very  much  lighter  substance  than  the  atmosphere  surrounding 
our  earth,  which  weighs  about  one  and  one-fourth  ounces  per 
cubic  foot.  This  would  be  a  fact  of  great  significance,  as  such 
a  body  would  readily  ascend  in  our  atmosphere.  The  absence 
of  a  weighable  mass  leaving  the  body  at  death  would  of  course 
be  no  argument  against  continuing  personality,  for  a  space- 
occupying  body  or  substance  might  exist  not  capable  of  being 
weighed,  such  as  the  ether. 

"  It  has  been  suggested  that  the  ether  might  be  that  substance, 
but  with  the  modern  conception  of  science  that  the  ether  is  the 
primary  form  of  all  substance,  that  all  other  forms  of  matter 
are  merely  differentiations  of  the  ether  having  varying  densities, 
then  it  seems  to  me  that  soul  substance,  which  in  this  life  must 
be  linked  organically  with  the  body,  cannot  be  identical  with 
the  ether.  Moreover,  the  ether  is  supposed  to  be  non-discon- 
tinuous, a  continuous  whole  and  not  capable  of  existing  in 
separate  masses  as  ether,  whereas  the  one  prime  requisite  for 
a  continuing  personality  or  individuality  is  the  quality  of 
separateness,  the  ego  as  separate  and  distinct  from  all  things 
else,  the  non-ego. 

"  To  my  mind,  therefore,  the  soul  substance  cannot  be  the 
ether  as  ether ;  but  if  the  theory  that  ether  is  the  primary  form 
of  all  substance  is  true,  then  the  soul  substance  must  necessarily 
be  a  differentiated  form  of  it. 

"If  it  is  definitely  proven  that  there  is  in  the  human  being  a 


PHOTOGRAPHING  &  WEIGHING  THE  SOUL    377 

loss  of  substance  at  death  not  accounted  for  by  known  channels 
of  loss,  and  that  such  loss  of  substance  does  not  occur  in  the 
dog,  as  my  experiments  would  seem  to  show,  then  we  have  here 
a  physiological  difference  between  the  human  and  the  canine  at 
least,  and  probably  between  the  human  and  all  other  forms  of 
animal  life. 

"  I  am  aware  that  a  very  large  number  of  experiments 
would  be  required  before  the  matter  could  be  proved  beyond 
any  possibility  of  error ;  but  if  further  and  sufficient  experi- 
mentation proves  that  there  is  a  loss  of  substance  occurring 
at  death  ;and  not  accounted  for  by  known  channels  of  loss, 
the  establishment  of  such  a  truth  cannot  fail  to  be  of  the 
utmost  importance. 

''  One  ounce  of  fact  more  or  less  will  have  more  weight  in 
demonstrating  the  truth  of  the  reality  of  continued  existence 
with  the  necessary  basis  of  substance  to  rest  upon  than  all  the  hair- 
splitting theories  of  theologians  and  metaphysicians  combined. 

'*  If  other  experiments  by  other  experimenters  prove  that 
there  is  a  loss  of  weight  occurring  at  death,  not  accounted  for 
by  known  channels  of  loss,  we  must  either  admit  the  theory 
that  it  is  the  hypothetical  soul  substance,  or  some  other  explana- 
tion of  the  phenomenon  should  be  forthcoming.  If  proved  true, 
the  materialistic  conception  will  have  been  fully  met,  and  proof 
of  the  substantial  basis  for  mind  or  spirit  or  soul  continuing 
after  the  death  of  the  body,  insisted  upon  as  necessary  by  the 
materialists,  will  have  been  furnished. 

"  It  will  prove  also  that  the  spiritualistic  conception  of  the 
immateriality  of  the  soul  is  wrong.  The  postulates  of  reli- 
gious creeds  have  not  been  a  positive  and  final  settlement  of 
the  question. 

"  The  theories  of  all  the  philosophers  and  all  the  philosophies 
offer  no  final  solution  of  the  problem  of  continued  personality 
after  bodily  death.  This  fact  alone  of  a  space-occupying  body 
of  measurable  w^eight  disappearing  at  death,  if  verified,  fur- 
nishes the  substantial  basis  for  persisting  personality  or  a 
conscious  ego  surviving  the  act  of  bodily  death ;  and  the  element 
of  certainty  is  worth  more  than  the  postulates  of  all  the  creeds 
and  all  the  metaphysical  arguments  combined. 


378  DEATH 

"  In  the  year  1854  Rudolph  Wagner,  the  physiologist,  at  the 
Gottingen  Congress  of  Physiologists,  proposed  a  discussion  of  a 
"  Special  Soul  Substance."  The  challenge  was  accepted,  but  no 
discussion  followed,  and  among  the  five  hundred  voices  present 
not  one  was  raised  in  defence  of  a  spiritualistic  philosophy. 
Have  we  found  Wagner's  soul  substance  1 " 

At  the  time  these  experiments  were  published,  one  of 
us  (Mr.  Carrington)  issued  the  following  criticism,  Avhich 
appeared  in  the  same  issue  of  the  Journal : — 

"...  Taking  the  experiments,  then,  as  Dr.  MacDougall  has 
described  them,  the  question  arises :  Granting  that  the  facts 
exist  as  stated,  would  these  results  prove  the  contention  that 
the  observed  loss  of  weight  was  due  to  the  exit  from  the  body 
of  some  hypothetical  soul  substance,  or  may  the  facts  (granting 
them  to  exist  as  stated)  be  explained  in  some  such  manner  as  to 
render  Dr.  MacDougall's  hypothesis  unnecessary  ? 

"  I  must  say  that  Dr.  MacDougall  seems  to  have  provided 
pretty  thoroughly  against  all  normal  losses  of  weight.  His 
papers  (which  I  have  had  the  privilege  of  reading)  indicate  this 
clearly.  The  only  channel  that  need  be  taken  seriously  into 
account  is  the  lungs ;  i.e.  the  loss  of  weight  due  to  expired  air. 
It  therefore  becomes  a  question  of  the  amount  of  air  the  lungs 
may  contain,  and  its  consequent  weight — granting,  for  the  sake 
of  argument,  that  every  particle  of  air  is  forced  out  of  the  lungs 
at  death.  A  cubic  foot  of  air,  at  the  ordinary  temperature  and 
at  sea-level,  weighs  about  1^  ounces,  we  are  told — a  statement 
that  is  confirmed  by  the  EncyclopcEclia  Britannica  and  other 
authorities.  In  the  cubic  foot  there  are  1728  cubic  inches. 
Now,  we  know  that  the  average  capacity  of  the  lungs  of  a 
healthy  human  being  is  about  225  to  250  cubic  inches  (Kirke, 
Physiology  J  p.  262) ;  but  let  us  say  300  cubic  inches,  to  be  on 
the  safe  side.  This  is,  as  nearly  as  possible,  one-sixth  ounce, 
granting  that  all  the  air  is  expired  at  death — for  which  we 
have  no  evidence — and  that  the  lungs  contained  as  much  as 
300  cubic  inches  of  air.  This  is  also  a  practical  impossibility, 
in  such  cases  as  those  quoted,  for  the  reason  that  this  repre- 


PHOTOGRAPHING  &  WEIGHING  THE  SOUL    379 

sents  the  state  of  healthy  lungs  at  the  moment  of  the  fullest 
inspiration.  The  majority  of  persons,  however,  could  not  inhale 
200  cubic  inches  (the  twelfth  of  an  ounce),  while  consumptive 
patients,  dying,  and  in  the  last  stages  of  the  disease,  would  not 
contain  within  their  lungs  anything  like  100  cubic  inches — the 
eighteenth  of  an  ounce.  When,  therefore.  Dr.  MacDougall 
tells  us  that  more  than  a  whole  ounce  is  lost  instantaneously, 
at  the  moment  of  death,  we  must  seek  elsewhere  than  in  this 
direction  for  the  explanation  of  the  facts." 

In  saying  this,  however,  we  must  not  lose  sight  of  the 

fact  that  there  are  certain  remarkable  variations  in  the 

human  body,  Avhen  it  is  alive — variations  which  are  most 

difficult  to  account  for  upon  normal,  physiological  lines. 

There  are  cases  on  record  in  which  patients  have  been 

known  to  take  on  more  weight  than  the  food  consumed 

by  them — though  all  the  bodily  w^eight  is  supposed  to  be 

obtained  from  the  food  eaten !     Cases  of  this  character, 

however,  might  perhaps   be  explained   as   follows :    The 

patient's  tissues  are  congested  and  hardened  (obstipated, 

as  it  is  called),  and  there  is  a  disproportion  of  solids  and 

fluids    within    the    system.       This    condition    has    been 

brought  about  by  the  ingesting  of  too  much  solid  and 

too  little  liquid  food.     When  such  a  person  is  deprived 

of  solid  food  for  some  time,  but  allowed  plenty  of  water, 

the  solid  portions  of  these  tissues  are  drawn  upon,  and  a 

portion  oxidised  off,  the  interstices  being  filled  in  Avith 

water.     In  some  such  manner,  then,  Ave  could  account 

for  these  extraordinary  increases  in  Aveight. 

There  are  also  remarkable  losses  in  Aveight — hard  to 
account  for  by  knoAvn  laAvs.  Chief  of  these  (and  far  too 
little  attention  has  been  paid  to  this  question)  is  the 
astonishing  loss  of  flesh  and  Aveight  sometimes  observed 
in  those  patients  Avho  are  suflering  great  pain  or  mental 
anguish.  In  such  cases,  very  frequently,  a  number  of 
pounds  is  lost  Avithin  a  few  days,  although  the  patient 


380  DEATH 

may  be,  throughout  that  period,  eating  his  regular  allow- 
ance of  food,  upon  which  he  is  accustomed  to  maintain, 
or  even  increase,  his  weight.  Losses  of  weight  of  this 
character  cannot  be  put  down  to  the  mere  inability  of 
the  organism  to  assimilate  the  food,  for  the  reason  that 
far  more  weight  is  lost,  very  frequently,  than  would  be 
lost  if  the  patient  fasted  entirely,  and  ate  nothing  at  all. 
Nor  can  the  Aveight  be  accounted  for  on  the  grounds  that 
a  larger  amount  of  katabolism  and  excretion  is  taking 
place  than  normally,  for  such  is  not  the  case.  There  is 
doubtless  an  altered  chemical  composition  of  the  body  at 
such  times ;  but,  so  far  as  we  know,  no  detailed  study  of 
this  has  yet  been  made. 

Rear-Admiral  George  W.  Melville  has  published  a 
remarkable  case  {The  Submarine  Boat,  p.  723),  in  which  a 
person  was  incased  in  an  air-tight  coffin  for  one  hour,  no 
fresh  air  being  allowed  him  during  that  period.  He 
survived  the  test,  but  it  was  found  that  he  had  lost  five 
pounds  in  weight  in  the  time  indicated — and  this,  be  it 
observed,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  he  had  taken  no 
physical  exercise  whatever '  He  had  throughout  re- 
mained at  rest  within  the  coffin.  When  this  case  was 
cited,  in  an  attempt  to  offset  Dr.  MacDougall's  results, 
he  replied,  saying  that,  under  the  circumstances,  the 
man  incased  in  the  coffin  would  doubtless  perspire 
profusely,  and  this  w^ould  account  for  the  observed  loss. 
Such  might  possibly  have  been  the  case;  but,  for  want 
of  further  corroboration,  it  is  impossible  to  settle  the 
matter  at  present  one  way  or  the  other. 

Dr.  MacDougall's  experiments  are  at  all  events  highly 
interesting  and  important — whether  they  prove  the  con- 
tention made  or  not — and  should  be  repeated  by 
physicians  and  physiologists  whenever  the  opportunity  is 
presented.  Certainly  experiments  of  this  nature,  whether 
successful  or  not,  would  fail   to  settle  the   question    of 


PHOTOGRAPHING  &  WEIGHING  THE  SOUL    381 

immortality  in  any  case — for  the  reason  that,  if  negative 
results  were  reached,  it  would  be  open  for  us  to  believe 
that  there  might  be  a  soul  which  is  incapable  of  being 
weighed ;  and  if  positive  results  Avere  reached,  it  might, 
on  the  other  hand,  be  contended  that  the  observed  loss 
of  weight  corresponded  merely  with  some  vital  or  etheric 
principle  which  left  the  body  at  death,  and  which  was 
in  no  way  related  to  consciousness  or  personal  identity. 
The  experiments,  therefore,  cannot  be  said  to  settle  the 
question ;  but  they  remain  highly  interesting  never- 
theless. 


CHAPTEE   V 

DEATH  COINCIDENCES 

1.  Apparitions  of  the  Dying. 

If  death  were  the  end  of  all,  it  would  represent  and 
necessitate  the  total  cessation  of  consciousness ;  if  it  be, 
on  the  contrary,  the  "departure  of  the  soul  from  the 
body,"  as  we  have  so  long  been  taught,  then  we  should 
expect  that,  in  exceptional  cases,  or  under  exceptional 
conditions,  it  might  be  possible  for  this  departing  soul  to 
manifest  itself  to  its  friends,  either  in  the  immediate 
vicinity,  or  even  at  a  distance — since  there  is  good 
reason  to  believe  that  "  space  "  has  no  such  meaning  in 
the  spiritual  w^orld  as  it  has  here.  (Nor  time.)  From 
the  accounts  we  have  read  it  is  evident  that  the  depart- 
ing spirit  sometimes  retains  full  possession  of  its  faculties, 
though  it  is  probable  that  this  only  happens  on  occasion, 
and  that,  in  a  large  number  of  cases,  probabty  the 
majority,  the  shock  and  Avrench  of  death  produces  a 
sort  of  temporary  suspension  of  consciousness,  just  as  a 
shock  or  accident  would  in  this  world.  Yet,  when  we 
come  to  inquire  into  the  literature  of  this  subject,  we 
find  that  such  death  coincidences,  or  manifestations  of 
the  departing  spirit,  at  the  moment  of  death,  are  by  no 
means  uncommon,  but  are,  on  the  contrary,  very  numer- 
ous ;  and  it  would  be  impossible  to  question  any  very 
large  number  of  individuals  without  finding  one  among 
them  who  had  experienced  something  of  the  sort  in  his 

3S2 


DEATH  COINCIDENCES  383 

life,  or  who  knew  of  some  one  who  had.  When  the 
English  Society  for  Psychical  Research  began  its  pioneer 
work,  in  1882,  it  had  no  notion  that  such  a  preponder- 
ance of  coincidences  would  be  found,  all  merging  towards 
the  moment  of  death ;  but  the  investigators  soon  found 
that  such  manifestations  far  outweighed  all  others  in 
number  and  in  character ;  and,  within  the  first  five  years 
of  the  Society's  work  (besides  all  the  cases  printed  in  the 
Proceedings  and  Journal  of  the  Society),  it  was  enabled 
to  publish  two  bulky  volumes,  bearing  entirely  on  this 
question  of  death  coincidences,  entitled  Phantasms  of  the 
Living.  In  these  volumes  were  printed  some  702  coin- 
cidental cases — in  which  an  apparition  of  the  dying 
person  had  been  seen  by  others  at  a  distance,  or  some 
other  sensory,  motor,  or  emotional  effect  had  been  noticed 
— coincidental  with  the  death  of  the  subject  whose 
figure  was  seen.  Putting  the  cases  to  the  test  of  calcu- 
lation, it  was  found  that  the  coincidences  were  many 
times  more  numerous  than  chance  could  account  for ; 
and  they  adopted  "  telepathy "  as  the  most  rational 
explanation  for  these  facts.  The  scientific  world,  how- 
ever, contended  that  not  enough  evidence  had  been 
collected ;  and  the  Society  accordingly  set  about  a 
large  international  statistical  inquiry,  which  occupied 
several  years.  Thirty  thousand  answers  were  received 
to  the  circular  of  inquiry  sent  out,  seventeen  thousand 
of  these  being  English.  The  Report  on  this  "  Census 
of  Hallucinations "  occupies  (practically)  the  whole  of 
the  tenth  volume  of  the  Proceedings  of  the  Society  for 
Psychical  Research.  After  making  allowances  for  error  in 
every  possible  direction,  and  really  overstating  the  case 
in  favour  of  scepticism,  the  result  was  again  reached, 
that  the  coincidences  were  many  times  more  numerous 
than  chance  could  account  for.  The  more  recent  inquiry 
of  the  American  Society,  so  far  as  it  has  gone,  and  the 


384  DEATH 

statistical  inquiry  conducted  some  years  ago  by  M. 
Flaiimiarion,  both  confirm  this  view.  (See  his  The  Un- 
knoiofi).  In  all  these  publications  many  instances  of  the 
kind  are  to  be  found  ;  and  so  well  authenticated  are  they, 
indeed,  that  we  feel  it  is  unnecessary  for  us  to  do  more 
than  give  one  or  two  cases,  as  typical  of  this  kind  of 
phenomenon. 

The  following  is  a  good  example  of  the  "  apparition  " 
type  of  death  coincidence.  It  was  printed  in  Proceedings 
of  the  Society  for  Psychical  Research,  vol.  x.,  pp.  213,  214  : — 

"...  About  the  14th  of  September  1882,  my  sister  and  I 
felt  worried  and  distressed  by  hearing  the  '  death  watch ' ;  it 
lasted  a  whole  day  and  night.  We  got  up  earlier  than  usual 
the  next  morning,  about  six  o'clock,  to  finish  some  birthday  pre- 
sents for  our  mother.  As  my  sister  and  I  were  working  and 
talking  together,  I  looked  up,  and  saw  our  young  acquaintance 
standing  in  front  of  me  and  looking  at  us.  I  turned  to  my 
sister ;  she  saw  nothing.  I  looked  again  to  where  he  stood  ; 
he  had  vanished.     We  agreed  not  to  tell  any  one.  .  .   . 

"  Some  time  afterwards  we  heard  that  our  young  acquaintance 
had  either  committed  suicide  or  had  been  killed ;  he  was  found 
dead  in  the  woods,  twenty-four  hours  after  landing.  On  looking 
back  to  my  diary,  I  found  that  my  marks  corresponded  to  the 
date  of  his  death." 

Mr.  Podmore  personally  interviewed  the  witnesses,  and 
ascertained  that  the  story  was  as  represented. 

The  following  incident  is  taken  from  M.  Flammarion's 
book,  The  Unknown,  p.  108  : — 

"  My  mother,  who  lived  at  Burgundy  .  .  .  heard  one  Tuesday, 
between  nine  and  ten  o'clock,  the  door  of  her  bedroom  open  and 
close  violently.  At  the  same  time  she  heard  herself  called 
twice,  '  Lucie  !  Lucie  ! '  The  following  Tuesday  she  heard  that 
her  uncle  Clementin,  who  had  always  had  a  great  affection  for 
her,  had  died  that  Tuesday  morning,  precisely  between  nine  and 
ten  0^ clock.  .  .  ." 


DEATH  COINCIDENCES  385 

On  pp.  169-72  of  this  work  is  described  a  remarkable 
case,  in  Avhich  the  brother  of  the  percipient  was  killed  in 
the  attack  on  the  Redan.  That  night  he  (the  percipient) 
awoke  suddenly  and  saw  : — 

"  Opposite  to  the  window  and  beside  my  bed,  my  brother  on 
his  knees  surrounded  by  a  sort  of  luminous  mist.  I  tried  to 
speak  to  him,  but  I  could  not.  ...  I  jumped  out  of  bed.  I 
looked  out  of  the  window  and  I  saw  that  there  was  no  moonlight. 
The  night  was  dark  and  it  was  raining  heavily,  great  drops 
pattering  on  the  window  panes.  My  poor  Oliver  was  still  there. 
Then. I  drew  near.  I  walked  right  through  the  ap]parition.  I 
reached  my  chamber  door,  and  as  I  turned  the  knob  to  open  it 
I  looked  back  once  more.  The  apparition  slowly  turned  its  head 
towards  me,  and  gave  me  another  look  full  of  anguish  and  of 
love.  Then  for  the  first  time  I  observed  a  wound  on  his  right 
temple,  and  from  it  trickled  a  little  stream  of  blood.  The  face 
was  pale  as  wax,  but  it  was  transparent.  .  .   ." 

Later,  a  letter  was  received,  stating  that  a  wound 
existed  on  the  face  of  the  dead  man  exactly  correspond- 
ing to  that  seen  in  the  apparition. 

Various  cases  of  raps  at  a  distance  are  recorded — cases 
in  which  these  mysterious  rappings  corresponded  exactly 
to  the  death  of  some  person ;  but  no  natural  cause  for 
these  rappings  has  yet  been  discovered.  In  most  cases 
nothing  of  the  sort  had  ever  been  heard  before  or  since. 
In  the  following  case,  which  is  very  remarkable,  a  'physical 
effect  was  noted,  as  will  be  seen.  It  is  included  in  Miss 
Alice  Johnson's  paper  "  On  Coincidences,"  Proceedings  of 
the  Society  for  Psychical  Research,  vol.  xiv.,  pp.  242—44  : — 

"A  friend  of  [the  narrator]  Mrs.  F.,  a  daughter  of  a  well- 
known  geologist,  has  related  to  [him]  a  rather  striking  instance 
of  telepathy  of  which  she  was  a  witness. 

"  A  few  years  ago,  she  was  sitting  on  the  rocks  above  the  sea 
at  Nervi,  near  Genoa,  where  she  resides  habitually,  with  an 
American  young  girl,  who  has  since  become  her  son's  wife.     The 

2b 


386  DEATH 

young  lady,  her  gloved  hands  resting  on  her  knees,  was  talking 
with  Mrs.  F.,  when  all  at  once  she  gave  a  slight  scream. 

"  '  What  is  the  matter  1 '  asked  Mrs.  F. 

*' '  My  finger  has  been  stung.' 

"  She  took  off  her  glove,  and  discovered  that  a  ring  of  hers 
had  snapped.  She  looked  at  it  with  a  scared  look  and  exclaimed  : 
'  Oh,  Mrs.  F.,  a  dear  friend  of  mine  has  just  died ! ' 

*'She  went  on  to  explain  that  the  ring  had  been  given  her  by 
a  young  man  at  the  time  of  her  leaving  the  United  States,  and 
that  he  had  said,  *  If  I  were  to  die  this  ring  would  apprise  you 
of  the  fact.' 

"  Mrs.  F.  pooh-poohed  the  matter,  herself  being  not  a  believer 
in  psychical  matters.  But,  a  few  weeks  later,  came  the  news 
of  that  young  man's  death.  Mrs.  F.  could  not  tell  [the  narrator] 
me  if  it  was  on  the  very  day  of  the  breaking  of  the  ring ;  but  she 
has  little  doubt  about  it." 

Here  we  have  a  choice  of  two  explanations.  Either 
it  may  be  supposed  that  a  telepathic  impulse  from  the 
dying  man  reached  the  subliminal  consciousness  of  the 
percipient  and  produced  a  motor  instead  of  a  sensory 
effect,  which  led  to  an  involuntary  muscular  spasm  of 
the  fingers,  resulting  in  the  breaking  of  the  ring;  or  it 
was  an  effect  produced  by  unknown  means  on  matter 
at  a  distance — telekinetic  agency.  In  any  case  the 
incident  is  a  remarkable  one,  no  matter  how  we  may- 
interpret  it. 

The  following  experience  is  signed  by  three  persons : 

the  lady,   Mrs.  S.  A.  C ,  who   had   the   dream ;  her 

daughter,  Mrs.  J.  C.  J ;  and  the   latter's   husband, 

Mr.  J.  C.  J .     The  reporter  writes  :  "  I  know  Mr.  and 

Mrs.  J.  C.  J personally,  and  can  vouch  for  their 

intelligence  as  witnesses  "  : — 

"It  has  taken  some  time  to  find  dates  connected  with  the 
dream  I  mentioned  to  you,  hence  the  delay.  I  have  at  last 
gathered  the  facts  as  follows  : — 


DEATH  COINCIDENCES  387 

"  Mrs.    D ,  my   father's  sister,   had,  with    husband    and 

family,  removed  from  our  home  in  Indiana  to  Nebraska  in  1882  j 
and  in  November  1885  she  and  her  husband  returned  to  visit 
the  old  home.  They  had  spent  but  a  day  or  two  with  us,  when 
a  special  invitation  came  from  friends  ten  miles  distant,  which 
they  accepted,  promising  to  return  to  us  about  November  13th. 

On  November  13th,  about  8  a.m.,  my  mother,  Mrs.  S.  A.  C , 

dreamed  that  Mary,  the   youngest  daughter  of  Mr.  and  Mrs. 

D ,  who  had  been  teaching  in  Nebraska,  was  very  ill  and 

could  not  live,  and  that  a  message  had  been  sent  to  her  father 
and  mother  to  come  home  at  once.  My  mother  was  so  impressed 
by  the  dream  that  she  awoke  and  slept  no  more  that  night. 
As  soon  as  we  arose  she  told  us  of  the  dream  and  of  her  anxiety  ; 
but  we  made  light  of  her  fears,  thinking  it  was  only  a  slight 
attack  of  indigestion. 

"  However,  we  learned  later,  that  at  3  a.m.  on  the  14th,  just 
twenty-four  hours  after  the  dream,  the  message  came,  '  Mary 
was  very  ill,  come  home  at  once ' ;  and  still  later,  that  she  died 
the  evening  of  the  14th,  many  hours  before  her  parents  reached 
home." 

The  following  case  is  reported  in  M.  Flammarion's 
The  Unknown,  p.  1 0  0  : — 

^'I  can  certify  to  you  the  truth  of  the  following  fact,  which 
occurred  in  a  little  town  in  the  department  of  the  Var.  My 
mother  was  sitting  in  a  room  in  the  lower  storey  of  her  house, 
either  knitting  or  sewing,  when  suddenly  she  saw  before  her 
her  eldest  brother,  who  lived  in  a  village  in  the  arrondissement  of 
Toulon,  about  twenty-five  miles  distant.  Her  brother,  whom 
she  recognised  perfectly,  said,  '  Adieu,'  and  disappeared.  My 
mother,  much  excited,  hastened  to  her  husband,  and  cried,  '  My 
brother  has  just  died  ! '     She  knew  he  was  ill. 

"  The  next  day  or  the  day  after  news  reached  them  of  the 
death  of  my  uncle,  which  happened  in  the  afternoon  jpreciMly  at 
the  time  of  the  apimrition.  There  were  no  telegraphs  in  those 
days.     The  news  had  been  sent  by  letter  to  Aix. 

"  Utte." 


388  DEATH 

The  following  case  appears  on  p.  101 : — 

"  It  has  twice  in  my  life  happened  to  me  to  experience  a  dis- 
tinct impression  to  have  near  me  a  person  who  was  absent,  and 
to  mark  the  exact  hour  at  which  this  occurred.  Both  times  the 
impression  received  was  found  to  coincide  within  five  minutes 
with  the  death  of  the  person  whom  I  knew  to  be  ill,  but  who  I 
had  no  idea  was  so  near  his  end. 

"These  two  striking  cases  of  telepathy  have  been  reported  in 
the  Journal  of  the  Psychical  Society  in  London,  of  which  I  have 
the  honour  to  be  an  associate  member, 

"  Aug.  Glardon, 
"  Man  of  Letters  at  Tour  de  Peitz, 
"  Yaud,  Switzerland." 

The  following  case  is  from  Mr.  Frank  Podmore's 
Apparitions  and   Thovght   Transference,  p.    265  : — 

"The  first  Thursday  in  April,  1881,  while  sitting  at  tea  with 
my  back  to  the  window,  and  talking  with  my  wife  in  the  usual 
way,  I  plainly  heard  a  rap  at  the  window,  and,  looking  round, 
I  said  to  my  wife,  '  Why,  there's  my  grandmother,'  and  went 
to  the  door,  but  could  not  see  any  one ;  and  still  feeling  sure 
it  was  my  grandmother,  and  knowing,  though  eighty-three  years 
of  age,  she  was  very  active  and  fond  of  a  joke,  I  went  round 
the  house,  but  could  not  see  any  one.  My  wife  did  not  hear  it. 
On  the  following  Saturday  I  had  news  my  grandmother  died 
in  Yorkshire  about  half-an-hour  before  the  time  I  heard  the 
rapping.  The  last  time  I  saw  her  alive  I  promised,  if  well, 
I  would  attend  her  funeral ;  that  was  some  two  years  before. 
I  was  in  good  health  and  had  no  trouble ;  age,  twenty-six  years. 
I  did  not  know  that  my  grandmother  was  ill. 

"  Rev.  Matthew  Frost." 

Mrs.  Frost  writes  : — 

"  I  beg  to  certify  that  I  perfectly  remember  all  the  cir- 
cumstances my  husband  has  named,  but  I  heardjand  saw  nothing 
myself." 


DEATH  COINCIDENCES  389 

The  following  is  an  unusually  interesting  case  :— 

*'It  was  in  Milan  on  10th  of  October  1888.  I  was  staying 
at  the  Hotel  Ancora.  After  dinner,  at  about  seven  o'clock, 
I  was  seated  on  the  sofa  reading  a  newspaper.  My  wife  was 
resting  in  the  same  room  on  a  couch  behind  a  curtain.  The 
room  was  lighted  by  a  lamp  upon  the  table  near  which  I 
was  sitting  reading.  Suddenly  I  saw  against  the  background 
of  the  door,  which  was  opposite  me,  my  father's  face.  He 
wore  as  usual  a  black  surtout,  and  was  deadly  pale.  At  that 
moment  I  heard  quite  close  to  my  ear  a  voice  which  said  to  me : 
'  A  telegram  is  coming  to  say  your  father  is  dead.'  All  this  only 
took  a  few  seconds.  .  .  .  On  the  evening  of  the  same  day,  at 
about  eleven  o'clock,  we  were  going  to  tea  in  the  company 
of  several  other  people.  .  .  .  All  at  once  there  was  a  knock  at 
the  door,  and  the  concierge  presented  a  telegram.  Pale  with 
emotion  I  immediately  exclaimed,  '  I  know  my  father  is  dead ; 
I  have  seen.  .  .  .'  The  telegram  contained  these  words  :  '  Papa 
dead,  suddenly. — Olga.'  It  was  a  telegram  from  my  sister 
living  at  St.  Petersburg.  I  learned  later  that  my  father  had 
committed  suicide  on  the  morning  of  the  same  day. 

''(Signed)         E.  A." 

Madame  A.  writes  : — 

"  I  was  present  at  the  time,  and  I  testify  to  the  accuracy  of 
the  account." 

The  following  case  is  from  Phantasms  of  the  Living, 
vol.  ii.,  p.  50  : — 

"On  February  26th,  1850,  I  was  awake,  for  I  was  to  go 
to  my  sister-in-law,  and  visiting  was  then  an  event  for  me. 
About  two  o'clock  in  the  morning  my  brother  walked  into  our 
room    (my    sister's)    and    stood   beside    my    bed.      I    called    to 

her,  '  There  is .'     He  was  at  the  time  quartered  in  Paisley, 

and  a  mail-car  from  Belfast  passed  about  that  hour  not  more 
than  about  half-a-mile  from  our  village.  .  .  .  He  looked  down 
most  lovingly,  and  kindly,  and  waved  his  hand,  and  he  was 
gone.     I  recollect  it  all  as  if  it  were  only  last  night  it  occurred , 


390  DEATH 

and  my  feeling  of  astonishment,  not  at  his  coming  into  the 
room  at  all,  but  whence  he  could  have  gone.  At  that  very 
hour  he  died." 

Mr.  Gurney  writes  : — 

"  We  have  confirmed  the  date  of  death  in  the  Army  List,  and 
find  from  a  newspaper  notice  that  the  death  took  place  in  the 
early  morning,  and  was  extremely  sudden." 

There  is  an  interesting  account  in  another  part  of  the 
volume  in  which  the  percipient  awoke  suddenly,  feeling 
that  he  had  received  a  terrible  blow  across  his  face. 
He  even  put  his  hands  to  his  lips,  to  see  if  there  was 
any  blood  upon  them.  The  pain  persisted  for  some 
time  after  he  had  awakened.  No  explanation  was  found 
for  this  until  later,  when  it  was  ascertained  that  his 
brother  had  been  struck  violently  in  the  mouth  by  the 
boom  of  a  sailing-boat  in  a  storm  and  almost  knocked 
overboard.  The  coincidence  in  time  was  also  verified. 
This  is  a  very  striking  incident. 

Many  other  cases  of  a  like  nature  could  be  quoted  in 
this  connection,  but  space  does  not  permit;  and  any 
lengthy  discussion  of  the  point  would  be  out  of  place  in 
a  work  of  this  character.  We  cannot  refrain  from  adding 
one  or  two  remarks,  however,  on  a  subject  that  is  of 
peculiar  interest  and  to  which  we  referred  in  the  first 
part  of  this  work.  We  refer  to  certain  olfactory  pheno- 
mena of  a  peculiar  nature. 

2.  Olfactory  Phenomena. 

In  Part  I.  of  the  present  work,  we  gave  some  remarkable 
cases  in  which  a  certain  smell  was  noted  at  the  moment 
of  death  ;  and  a  summary  of  the  attempts  that  had  been 
made  to  solve  this  mystery.  We  shall  now  give  a  few 
cases  where  very  much  the  same  phenomena  have  been 


DEATH  COINCIDENCES  391 

noted  under  conditions  that  render  the  hypothesis  pre- 
viously advanced  quite  impossible.  The  theory  was 
that  some  sort  of  chemical  action  went  on  in  the  body, 
and  that  this  was  the  cause  of  the  odour  noted.  Of 
course,  if  such  were  the  case  (and  it  may  have  been 
in  the  cases  cited),  it  would  be  quite  impossible  for 
such  smell  to  be  noticed  heyond  the  limits  of  sense  ^ercerp- 
tion ;  and  if  such  an  odour  was  noticed  miles  away  at 
the  time  of  death,  and  found  afterwards  to  correspond 
with  it,  it  would  be  pretty  fair  evidence  that  chemical 
action  and  sense-perceptions  would  not  serve  to  account 
for  all  the  facts,  but  that  some  sort  of  "  psychic  "  factor 
entered  into  the  case  also.  That  this  is  so  in  a  number 
of  instances,  we  think  we  can  easily  prove. 

There  is  a  case  recorded  in  the  Journal  of  the  Ameri- 
can Society  for  Psychical  Research,  e.g.  (Sept.  1907,  pp. 
436-9),  in  which  the  smell  of  violets  was  very  plainly 
observed  whenever  the  inmates  of  the  house  had  good 
reason  to  suppose  the  son  of  the  house  (deceased)  was 
present.  This  happened  on  several  occasions,  and  was 
observed  by  the  mother,  the  little  boy,  the  eldest  son, 
and  his  wife.  All  sensed  the  perfume  of  violets  very 
strongly.  In  a  case  known  to  one  of  us,  a  family  of 
spiritualists  was  in  the  habit  of  holding  seances  in  their 
own  family  circle,  no  one  else  being  present,  and  especially 
were  these  st-ances  held  on  the  anniversary  of  the  father's 
death.  On  such  occasions  there  was  frequently  a  strong 
smell  of  violets  manifest — so  strong,  we  are  assured, 
that  the  fragrance  remained  in  the  room  for  several  hours 
after  the  seance  had  terminated.  In  both  of  these  cases 
the  person  who  died  was  especially  fond  of  violets,  and 
in  the  former  case  a  bunch  of  violets  was  buried  with 
the  body.  Mr.  Myers  gives  an  instance  in  which  thyme 
was  strongly  smelt  by  a  gentleman  walking  through  a 
field,  in  which  it  was  reported  that  a  young  woman  had 


392  DEATH 

been  murdered,  and  that  "  any  one  walking  in  that  field 
would  smell  thyme."  Mr.  Highton,  who  experienced 
this,  was  engrossed  in  other  thoughts,  and  had  totally 
forgotten  the  incident — at  least  for  the  time  being. 
There  are  several  cases  known  to  us  in  which  a  distinct 
scent  has  been  perceived  at  a  distance  by  individuals 
— such  scent  corresponding  to  the  death  of  the  person 
with  whose  individuality  this  scent  was  closely  associated. 
Certainly  such  cases  are  not  due  to  chemical  com- 
bustion, or  to  any  physical  cause — whatever  their  real 
nature  may  be.  They  are  mental  or  psychological  facts. 
That  they  are  hallucinatory  in  most  cases  cannot  be 
doubted — this  being  borne  out  by  a  series  of  experi- 
ments in  the  transference  of  certain  tastes  from  operator 
to  percipient  in  thought-transference  experiments.  (See 
Phantasms  of  the  Living,  vol.  i.,  pp.  51-8;  vol.  ii.,  pp. 
324-31,  339,  344,  666-8).  But  it  would  seem  that 
in  some  cases  real  scent  may  be  secreted  by  the  body — - 
or  something  closely  resembling  it — as  was  the  case  with 
Stainton  Moses.  At  some  of  his  stances,  it  was  asserted 
that  scent  was  manufactured,  and  came  from  the  top  of 
his  head,  where  it  could  be  felt  !  Certainly  it  was  smelt 
by  all  present.  It  was  closely  allied  to  the  scent  of 
flowers.  Nor  is  this  so  inherently  improbable  as  many 
might  suppose.     Sir  William  Ramsay  stated  that : — 

"  Perspiration  ^  consists  of  caproate  of  glyceryl,  mixed  with 
free  acid,  I  believe.  It  does  not  smell  nice ;  but  pure  caproates 
are  very  fragrant  if  the  right  alcoholic^  base  is  combined.     I 

1  It  must  be  remembered,  in  this  connection,  that  animals  are  enabled 
to  follow  the  *'  scent "  of  a  person  with  great  precision,  and  often  for 
miles.  This  would  certainly  seem  to  indicate  that  some  subtle  but  power- 
ful odour  is  emitted  from  the  surface  of  the  body,  and  that  it  permeates 
the  clothing  and  atmosphere  of  the  person  in  every  case.  How,  other- 
wise, is  the  above  fact  to  be  accounted  for — a  fact  so  well  attested  that 
any  dispute  on  this  point  is  useless  ?  It  would  certainly  seem  that  each 
person  has  an  "  aura"  of  his  own — physical  as  well  as  psychical.  There 
are  indications,  also,  that  this  odour  is  largely  characterised  by  the  char 


DEATH  COINCIDENCES  393 

fancy  that  woodruffe  and  verbena  are  of  the  same  nature  as 
turpentine,  and  have  probably  the  same  percentage  composition. 
However,  so  far  as  I  know,  they  have  never  been  investigated." 


acter  of  the  diet.  It  is  a  well-known  fact  that  a  carnivorous  animal  will 
not  eat  a  carnivorous  animal — will  not  eat  a  man  if  a  horse  is  near  by,  for 
example.  Instinct  tells  a  carnivorous  animal  that  the  flesh  of  other  carni- 
vorous animals  is  tainted  ;  that  it  is  not  good  food,  and  he  will  not  eat  it. 
Otherwise  a  dog  would  not  only  kill  a  cat,  but  would  eat  it  too.  But  both 
a  cat  and  a  dog  will  eat  a  mouse,  for  the  reason  that  the  mouse  is  a  vege- 
tarian animal.  It  is  the  same  throughout  the  animal  world.  These  facts 
certainly  seem  to  indicate  that  the  character  of  the  bodily  odour  is  largely 
determined  by  the  nature  of  the  food  ;  and,  in  support  of  this,  it  may  be 
said  that,  in  the  case  of  those  persons  who  subsist  largely  on  fish,  the 
odour  of  their  bodies  is  often  very  repellent  and  characteristic.  They 
smell  decidedly  of  fish  1 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE— PSYCHICAL  RESEARCH 

Part  I. — The  Physical  Phenomena. 

And  now  we  come  to  the  final,  and  to  many  minds  tlie 
most  conclusive,  proofs  of  the  persistence  of  conscious- 
ness after  the  death  of  the  body — the  "  Immortality  of 
the  Soul."  In  the  first  part  of  this  book  we  confined 
ourselves  to  a  consideration  of  the  physical  or  physio- 
logical side  of  death  only ;  and  for  our  purposes  it  made 
no  difference  to  us  whether  man  had  a  soul  or  no.  We 
were  studying  his  death  and  its  causes  as  we  might  study 
that  of  any  animal.  With  that  we  stopped.  But  the 
question  could  not  but  come  up  in  this  connection  : 
"  What  becomes  of  the  mental  man  after  this  dis- 
ruption of  the  body — his  consciousness  or  soul-life  ?  Is 
that  too  annihilated,  as  his  body  is  disintegrated,  or  does 
it  continue  to  persist  in  some  other  sphere  of  activity  ? " 
To  that  question  we  then  addressed  ourselves ;  and  we 
found  that,  although  a  strong  presumiDtion  was  raised  in 
favour  of  the  persistence  of  individual  consciousness 
by  the  philosophical,  theological,  and  other  arguments 
that  were  advanced  in  its  favour,  none  of  these  proved 
conclusive ;  we  had  to  seek  further,  and  obtain  more  direct 
evidence  still.  We  accordingly  turned  to  science — to  see 
what  that  had  to  say  upon  this  question,  and  Avhile  we 
found  that  "  orthodox  "  science  was  silent  on  this  subject, 
the  phenomena  forming  the  basis  of  so-called  psychical 

394 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  395 

research  are  apparently  real ;  and,  taken  together,  form 
a  strong  case  in  favour  of  the  survival  of  some  sort  of 
soul — something  in  man  capable  of  producing  these  re- 
markable phenomena,  after  it  has  ceased  its  connection 
with  the  bodily  organism.  The  series  of  cases  we  have 
presented  form  a  gradual  but  yet  logically-connected  chain 
— showing  that  the  soul  of  man  leaves  the  body  at  the 
moment  of  death — being  seen  by  others,  as  well  as  being 
aware  of  that  fact  itself;  and  that  this  soul  is  able  to 
manifest  at  great  distances,  on  occasion,  at  the  moment 
of  its  departure,  or  very  shortly  afterwards.  We  en- 
deavoured to  support  this  testimony  by  actual  experi- 
mental evidence — photographing  and  weighing  the  soul. 
All  these  cases,  taken  en  masse,  may  fairly  be  said  to 
raise  a  presumption  in  favour  of  the  persistence  of  some- 
thing in  man  capable  of  surviving  the  death  of  the 
body ;  and  it  only  remains  for  us  to  see  whether  this 
"  something  "  possesses  memory  and  the  personal  identity 
we  once  knew.  If  that  be  proved,  then  a  spiritual 
world  of  some  sort  may  fairly  be  said  to  have  been 
demonstrated. 

Now,  there  are  two  types  of  phenomena  which  might 
prove  this  persistence  of  consciousness  and  personal 
identity.  These  are  (1)  physical  phenomena;  and  (2) 
mental  phenomena.  In  the  former  case  we  have 
certain  material  happenings — real,  objective  facts,  and, 
behind  them,  there  is  often  an  intelligence — one,  ap- 
parently, which  is  not  that  of  the  medium  through 
whom  these  manifestations  occur.  We  shall  consider 
these  first.  Coming  next  to  the  mental  phenomena,  we 
shall  find  much  more  abundant  and  conclusive  evidence 
in  favour  of  personal  identity.  But  to  these  we  shall 
come  in  good  time. 


396  DEATH 

1.  The  Phenomena  of  Independent  Voices. 

The  phenomena  we  are  now  about  to  record  are  so 
remarkable  that  a  certain  amount  of  scepticism  is 
warrantable.  We  shall  merely  state  the  facts,  however, 
and  let  the  reader  form  his  own  opinion  as  to  the  causes 
of  the  phenomena.  In  cases  of  this  character,  the  in- 
vestigators sit  in  a  room  (in  some  cases  darkened  and  in 
other  cases  light),  and  "  voices  "  issue  from  the  air — oc- 
casionally coming  from  "  empty  nothingness "  ;  some- 
times from  a  horn,  which  has  been  provided  to  direct 
and  intensify  the  sounds.  When  the  room  is  in  darkness 
there  is,  of  course,  no  evidence  that  the  medium  herself 
is  not  manipulating  the  trumpet  and  doing  the  talking ; 
and  we  always  have  to  assume  for  evidential  purposes 
that  she  is.  In  light  seances  it  can  be  seen  that  she 
herself  is  not  doing  the  talking.  In  any  case  the  fact  of 
the  independent  voice — whether  it  exists  or  not — is  of 
secondary  importance  for  our  present  purposes.  For  us, 
the  primary  question  is :  Does  the  voice  tell  us  anything 
that  is  evidential  ?  Does  it  tell  us  anything  which  the 
medium  could  not  have  known  ?  Is  there  proof  of 
identity  ?  That  is  the  crucial  problem.  Assuming,  for 
the  sake  of  argument,  that  the  medium  actually  does  all 
the  talking,  in  such  cases,  the  question  arises, — Where 
does  she  get  the  facts  that  are  imparted  ?  The  super- 
normal information  given  is  the  crux,  in  cases  of  this 
character.  We  summarise  one  or  two  striking  cases  of 
this  type  in  which  apparently  supernormal  information 
was  given.  The  first  appeared  in  the  02:)en  Court  Magazine 
(May-June,  1908),  under  the  signature  of  Mr.  David  P. 
Abbott — a  gentleman  who  is  very  well  versed  in  all 
methods  of  trickery,  and  whose  book.  Behind  the  Scenes  with 
the  Mediums,  is  a  classic  in  its  way.  Nevertheless,  Mr. 
Abbott   has  some  remarkable   things   to   tell   us  of  his 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  397 

visit  to  Mrs.  Blake.  The  following  passages  are  from 
his  report  on  the  case,  entitled  "  The  History  of  a  Strange 
Case :  A  Study  in  Occultism  "  : — 

'*  Dr.  X stated  that  at  his  first  sitting  he  was  completely 

*  taken  off  his  feet,  so  to  speak,'  and  considered  spirit  communion 
as  proven ;  but  that  upon  subsequent  occasions,  he  was  sorry  to 
state  things  had  occurred  to  lessen  this  belief.  He  related 
many  marvellous  incidents  of  conversation  with  the  voices,  and 
stated  that  he  had  taken  many  friends  to  the  lady  under  assumed 
names ;  ^et  he  had  neve?-  failed  to  hear  the  voices  call  these  persons 
hy  their  right  names,  etc.  He  also  stated  that  the  information 
furnished  by  Mrs.  Blake's  voices  at  times  had  seemed  so 
marvellous  that  he  had  seriously  contemplated  referring  her 
case  to  the  Society  for  Psychical  Research,  in  order  that  he 
might  have  an  authoritative  statement  with  regard  to  what  her 
powers  really  consisted  of.  I  quote  a  few  extracts  from  many 
in  his  letters  : — 

"  '  Twenty-two  years  ago  this  summer,  my  father  took  me  to 
Virginia  for  the  purpose  of  entering  me  in  college.  I  was  an 
only  child,  had  not  been  away  from  home  a  great  deal,  and  was 
quite  young ;  therefore  he  accompanied  me  to  Blacksburg, 
Virginia,  introduced  me  to  the  president  of  the  school,  and 
otherwise  assisted  me  in  getting  started.  It  was  a  military 
school,  and  every  new-comer  was  called  a  "  rat,"  and  this  was 
yelled  at  him  by  the  older  students  in  chorus  until  it  grated 
upon  his  nerves  to  a  considerable  extent. 

"  '  As  my  father  and  myself  walked  up  towards  the  college 
buildings  over  the  broad  campus,  the  word  "rat"  was  yelled  at 
us  with  depressing  distinctness.  We  went  across  the  campus 
and  on  beyond  to  a  large  grove  of  virgin  forest,  where  we  sat 
down  upon  a  large  log ;  and  here  my  father  gave  me  some 
paternal  advice.  He  was  going  to  leave  the  next  morning,  and 
I  felt  very  sad  and  lonely ;  and  it  was  with  great  difficulty  that 
I  kept  back  the  tears  that  in  spite  of  myself  would  now  and  then 
trickle  down  my  cheeks.  At  all  of  this  my  father  laughed  and 
said  that  I  would  be  all  right  in  a  few  days. 

*' '  When  conversing  through  Mrs.  Blake's  trumpet  with  the 


398  DEATH 

supposed  voice  of  my  father,  the  following  conversation  with  the 
voice  occurred.  I  had  previously  written  out  the  questions  and 
I  have  since  added  the  answers  of  the  voice : — 

"  '  Do  you  remember  the  time  you  took  me  off  to  college? '  I 
asked. 

"  *  Yes,  as  distinctly  as  if  it  were  yesterday/  the  voice  replied. 

"  '  When  we  walked  towards  the  buildings,  what  was  said  to 
me  by  some  of  the  students  1 ' 

*' '  They  yelled  "  Rat "  at  you.' 

" '  Spell  that  word,'  1  requested,  as  I  desired  no  misunder- 
standing. 

<' '  R, — a — t,'  spelled  the  voice. 

"  '  Where  did  we  go  after  leaving  the  campus  and  college 
buildings  ? '  I  next  asked. 

" '  We  went  to  a  large  grove  near  the  college  buildings  and 
sat  down  upon  a  hickory  log,'  responded  the  voice. 

"  '  What  did  I  do  and  say  while  sitting  on  this  log? ' 

" '  You  cried  because  I  was  going  to  leave  you  and  go  home,' 
answered  the  voice.  All  of  this  was  wonderfully  accurate,  but 
I  do  not  know  whether  or  not  the  log  was  hickory.' 

"  In  another  letter  he  says : — '  On  one  occasion  a  voice  sup- 
posed to  be  my  grandfather's  talked  with  me,  and  I  asked  it 
what  had  caused  him  to  depart  this  life.  Just  previous  to 
asking  this  question  the  voice  had  been  full  and  strong ;  but 
upon  asking  it  the  voice  became  indistinct,  and  I  concluded  that 
my  question  had  '  put  the  lady  out  of  business.'  To  my  surprise, 
in  a  few  minutes  my  grandfather  commenced  to  talk  again  ; 
and  I  reminded  him  that  he  had  not  answered  my  question. 
He  replied  by  saying  that  I  knew  perfectly  well  what  had 
caused  him  to  depart  this  life,  and  that  it  was  not  necessary  to 
ask  such  unimportant  questions. 

*'  I  replied  by  stating  that  I  wanted  the  question  answered,  in 
order  that  I  might  be  convinced  as  to  his  identity ;  and  also  to 
know  that  he  had  sufficient  consciousness  and  intelligence  to 
reply.  He  then  stated  that  the  immediate  cause  of  his  death 
was  a  fracture  of  the  skull.  '  How  did  this  happen  ? '  I  asked. 
"  '  By  falling  down  a  stairway,'  answered  the  voice. 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  399 

"  'In  what  town  and  house  did  this  occur?' 

** '  In  Galliopolis,  Ohio,  in  my  son's  home,'  again  responded 
the  voice.     All  of  this  was  correct. 

"I  next  asked  my  grandfather's  voice  if  he  remembered  what 
he  used  to  entertain  me  with  when  I  was  a  child.  He  replied 
that  he  did ;  that  he  had  made  little  boats  for  me,  and  had 
floated  them  in  a  tub  of  water.  I  asked  how  old  I  was  when 
this  took  place,  and  he  replied  that  I  was  five  years  old.  This 
was  correct,  and  had  occurred  some  thirty-four  years  ago.  .   .  . 

"  A  loud  voice  of  a  man  now  broke  into  the  conversation.  It 
was  vocal  in  tone,  low  in  pitch,  and  had  a  weird  effect. 

"  '  How  do  you  do  ? '  said  the  voice. 

"  '  How  do  you  do,  sir  1     Who  are  you  ? '  asked  Mr.  Clawson. 

'* '  Grandpa,'  replied  the  voice. 

"  '  Grandpa  who  ? '  asked  Mr.  Clawson. 

" '  Grandpa  Abbott,'  said  the  voice,  and  it  repeated,  hurriedly, 
a  name  that  sounded  like  '  David  Abbott ' ;  and  then  the  voice 
expired  with  a  sound  as  of  some  one  choking  or  strangling,  as  it 
went  off  dimly  and  vanished.  '  David '  was  my  grandfather 
Abbott's  Christian  name. 

"  The  lady  now  laid  the  trumpet  down  in  her  lap  and  said,  *  Let 
it  rest  in  our  hands  until  we  regain  strength.'  In  a  few 
moments  she  turned  her  chair  so  as  to  face  the  opposite  direc- 
tion, and  said,  '  I  will  use  my  other  ear ;  my  arm  is  tired.' 

"  Now,  while  they  were  resting,  I  determined  to  offer  a  sug- 
gestion to  the  lady  indirectly,  and  to  note  what  the  effect  would 
be.  Turning  to  Mr.  Clawson,  but  not  calling  him  by  name,  I 
remarked,  '  It  is  strange  that  those  we  want  so  much  do  not 
come ;  that  your  daughter,  to  whom  you  would  rather  talk  than 
to  any  one,  does  not  speak  to  you.  You  have  evidently  talked 
to  her,  and  she  seems  to  identify  herself ;  but  is  it  not  strange 
that  she  does  not  give  her  name  correctly  ? '  I  said  this  in 
order  to  convey  to  the  lady  the  fact  that  the  name  which 
appeared  to  be  *  Edna '  was  not  the  correct  name  of  the 
gentleman's  daughter. 

"  When  next  he  raised  the  trumpet  to  his  ear  a  whispered 
voice  said,  'Daddie,  I  am  here.' 

"  '  Who  are  you  ? '  asked  Mr.  Clawson. 


400  DEATH 

"  '  Georgia,  replied  the  voice. 

"  '  Georgia  ?  Georgia,  is  this  really  you  ? '  asked  Mr.  Clawson, 
with  intense  emotion  and  earnestness. 

"'Yes,  Daddie.  Didn't  you  think  1  knew  my  own  name?' 
asked  the  voice. 

"■ '  I  thought  you  did,  Georgia,  but  could  not  understand  why 
you  would  not  tell  it  to  me.     Where  do  we  live,  Georgia?' 

" '  In  Kansas  City,'  responded  the  voice,  and  then  continued, 
'  Daddie,  I  am  so  glad  to  talk  to  you,  and  so  glad  you  came 
here  to  see  me.  I  wish  you  could  see  my  beautiful  home.  We 
have  flowers  and  music  every  day.' 

" '  Georgia,  what  is  the  name  of  your  sweetheart  to  whom  you 
were  engaged  ? '  now  asked  Mr.  Clawson. 

"  ' .'     The  reply  could  not  be  understood. 

*' '  Georgia,  spell  the  name,'  requested  Mr.  Clawson. 

*'  'A — r — c,  Ark,'  responded  the  voice,  spelling  out  the  letters 
and  then  pronouncing  the  name. 

" '  Give  me  his  full  name,  Georgia,'  requested  Mr.  Clawson. 

*' '  Archimedes,'  now  responded  the  voice. 

"  '  Will  you  spell  the  name  for  me  ? '  asked  Mr.  Clawson,  who 
wished  to  prevent  a  misinterpretation  of  sounds. 

"'  A — r — c — h — i — m — e — d — e — s,'  spelled  the  voice. 

"'Where  is  Ark,  Georgia?'  now  asked  Mr.  Clawson.  The 
reply  could  not  be  understood,  but  an  inarticulate  sentence  was 
spoken,  ending  with  a  word  which  sounded  like  '  Denver.' 

'"  Do  you  say  he  is  in  Denver,  Georgia?'  asked  Mr.  Clawson. 

"  '  No,  no,'  responded  the  voice  loudly  and  almost  vocally, 
and  then  continued,  'He  is  in  New  York.'  This,  Mr.  Clawson 
afterwards  informed  me,  was  correct ;  but  he  thought  the 
gentleman  was  at  the  time  out  of  New  York  City,  though 
somewhere  in  that  State. 

" '  Daddie,  I  want  to  tell  you  something.  Ark  is  going  to 
marry  another  girl,'  now  continued  the  voice. 

"  '  Georgia,  you  say  Ark  is  going  to  marry  another  girl,'  asked 
Mr.  Clawson. 

"  '  Yes,  Daddie,  but  it's  all  right.  It's  all  right  now.  He  does 
not  love  her  as  he  did  me,  but  it  is  all  right.  I  do  not  care 
now.' 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  401 

Much  more  to  like  effect  could  be  quoted  from  investi- 
gations of  Mrs.  Blake,  did  space  permit.  It  will  be  seen, 
at  all  events,  that,  no  matter  what  the  source  of  the 
voice,  much  information,  apparently  supernormal,  was 
given — and  information  suggesting  the  intelligence  of 
some  deceased  person. 

In  his  Psycliic  Bidclle,  Dr.  I.  K.  Funk  has  recorded  a 
remarkable  case  of  apparently  independent  voices — 
though  the  evidence  is  not  so  good  or  so  convincing  as 
in  the  last  case.  But  it  is  very  striking,  none  the  less. 
The  medium — Mrs.  Emily  S.  French — insists  upon  com- 
plete darkness,  and  no  ray  of  light  is  admitted  at  any  of 
her  seances.  Mrs.  French  is  quite  an  old  woman,  and  is 
deaf  to  much  that  passes  around  her.  This  deafness  was 
attested  by  several  doctors.  Nevertheless,  the  voices  in 
this  case  catch  up  any  remark  that  the  sitters  may  make, 
and  pass  comments  upon  it  with  surprising  alacrity.  Dr. 
Funk  assures  us  that  he  frequently  heard  (so  it  seemed) 
the  normal  voice  of  the  medium  at  the  same  time  as  the 
voice  of  the  intelligence  doing  the  talking.  If  this  is  so,  it 
is  very  curious,  to  say  the  least.  Dr.  Funk  devoted  most 
of  his  twelve  sittings,  and  his  supplementary  sitting  at 
Rochester,  to  testing  the  hypothesis  of  fraud,  and  he 
details  his  precautions  at  great  length.  "  Red  Jacket,"  a 
supposed  Indian  control,  did  most  of  the  talking,  and 
there  was  very  little  supernormal  information  volun- 
teered. The  case  is  most  interesting,  and  it  deserves 
thorough  and  prolonged  investigation.  Its  nature,  how- 
ever, prevents  our  quoting  it  at  length  in  this 
place. 

The  case  of  "  Mrs.  Smiley,"  detailed  by  Hamlin  Garland, 
in  "  The  Shadow  World,"  a  series  of  articles  that  appeared 
in  Emryhodys  Magazine,  beginning  in  April  19 08,  presents 
another  interesting  case  of  independent  voice  phenomena. 
The    "  Mrs.   Smiley,"  introduced   in   these   studies,  is   a 

2c 


402  DEATH 

Western  woman  who  is  well  known  to  all  the  leading 
investigators  of  psychical  problems ;  and  while  the  semi- 
fictional  style  adopted  by  the  author  detracts  from  the 
evidential  value  of  the  experiences  described,  Mr.  Gar- 
land's assurance  that  the  facts  are  personal  experiences, 
and  as  true  in  every  particular  as  the  reports  that  he  has 
filed  with  the  American  Society  for  Psychical  Research, 
may  to  some  degree  remove  this  objection.  If  we  did 
not  accept  Mr.  Garland's  statement,  we  should  not 
mention  the  experiments  here. 

In  describing  the  precautions  that  were  taken  to  pre- 
vent trickery,  Mr.  Garland  states  that  he  took  from  his 
pocket  a  spool  of  strong  silk  twist,  with  which  he  very 
carefully  fastened  the  psychic's  wrists.  "  Each  arm  was 
tied  separately  in  such  wise  that  she  was  unable  to  bring 
her  hands  together,  and  could  not  raise  her  wrists  an 
inch  from  the  chair.  Next,  with  the  aid  of  Mrs.  Cameron, 
I  looped  a  long  piece  of  tape  about  Mrs.  Smiley's  ankles, 
knotted  it  about  the  rungs  of  the  chair  at  the  back,  and 
nailed  the  loose  ends  to  the  floor.  I  then  drew  chalk 
marks  on  the  floor  about  the  chair  legs,  in  order  that 
any  movement  of  the  chair,  no  matter  how  slight,  might 
show.  Finally,  I  pushed  the  table  (on  which  the  tin 
horn  stood)  fully  two  feet  away  from  the  psychic's 
utmost  reach." 

After  describing  the  physical  phenomena  produced 
through  "  Mrs.  Smiley's "  mediumship — the  ringing  of 
bells,  the  movement  of  objects,  the  writing,  and  other 
results  that  were  obtained,  apparently  without  any  effort 
on  the  part  of  the  psychic,  Mr.  Garland  details  what  he 
terms  "  the  supreme  test" — a  test  that  was  a  complete 
failure  in  one  respect,  though  astonishingly  successful  in 
another. 

We  quote  at  length  from  Evcryhodys  Magazine,  July 
1908:— 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  403 

"  Hardly  were  we  settled  in  place  when  a  sound  came  from 
the  cone  as  though  some  one  were  tapping  on  it  with  the  end 
of  a  lead  pencil.     'Is  that  you,  comrade  Wilbur?'  I  asked. 

'*  Tap,  tap,  tap,  he  answered  vigorously. 

"  '  I  thought  I  recognised  your  tap,'  I  answered.  '  I  am  glad 
you  are  here,  and  I  hope  you  are  going  to  hand  us  out  the  finest 
possible  test.     Is  Mr.  Mitchell  present  ? ' 

*'  To  my  delight  the  cone  was  instantly  lifted,  and  the  voice 
of  '  Mitchell '  answered  me.  .  .  .  He  spoke  to  me  upon  the  in- 
vestigation that  we  were  pursuing.  ,  .  .  He  solemnly  urged  me 
to  proceed  in  this  work,  and  at  last  said,  '  Good-bye  for  the 
present/  and  fell  silent. 

*'The  cone  was  then  deposited  on  the  table,  and  'Maudie' 
(another  control)  said  :  '  If  Mr.  Garland  and  Mr.  Fowler  will  go 
quietly  up  to  mamma's  side,  holding  all  the  time  tightly  to  the 
threads,  Mr.  Mitchell  will  do  what  Mr.  Garland  so  much  desires. 
Please  be  very  careful  not  to  touch  mamma  until  I  tell  you. 
Keep  as  far  apart  as  you  can  as  you  go  up  to  her.  When  you 
reach  my  mamma's  side,  you  may  put  one  hand  on  her  head  and 
one  on  her  wrist.  Mr.  Mitchell  says  :  Please  have  Mr.  Brierly 
take  Mrs.  Fowler's  hand,  so  that  every  hand  in  the  circle  is 
accounted  for.' 

"  I  was  now  very  eager  and  very  alert.  Surely  no  trickster 
would  permit  such  rigorous  control  as  that  which  we  were  now 
invited  to  exercise.  My  admiration  went  out  towards  this 
heroic  little  woman,  who  was  enduring  so  much  pain  and  sus- 
picion for  the  sake  of  science. 

"  Slowly  we  crept  to  her  side,  being  careful  to  touch  nothing 
until  directed  by  the  voice  of  '  Maud.'  At  last  the  childish 
voice  said  :  '  Mr.  Garland  may  put  his  right  hand  on  top  of 
mamma's  head,  and  his  left  hand  on  her  wrist.  Mr.  Fowler  may 
put  his  left  hand  on  Mr.  Garland's,  and  his  right  hand  on 
mamma's  wrist.  Mr.  Mitchell  says  that  he  will  then  see  if  the 
voices  will  not  come.' 

"  I  then  said  aloud :  '  Brierly,  my  right  hand  is  on  the 
pyschic's  head,  my  left  is  on  her  wrist.' 

"  Fowler  repeated  :  *  My  left  hand  is  above  Garland's  right, 
which  is  on  the  psychic's  head,  and  my  own  right  hand  is  on  the 
right  wrist  of  the  psychic.     Now,  Wilbur,  go  ahead.' 


404  DEATH 

"  Our  challenge  was  almost  instantly  caught  up.  While  we 
were  thus  doubly  safeguarding  the  psychic,  the  cone,  which  was 
resting  on  the  table  a  full  yard  away,  rose  with  a  sharp,  metallic, 
scraping  sound,  and  remained  in  the  air  for  fully  half-a-minute, 
during  which  I  called  out  sharply  :  '  We  are  absolutely  control- 
ling the  psychic  ;  her  hands  are  motionless.  Brierly,  be  sure  of 
both  Mrs.  Fowler's  hands.' 

"  '  I  have  her  hands  in  mine,'  he  answered. 

"  As  the  cone  was  gently  returned  to  the  carpet,  I  said : 
'  Fowler,  that  was  a  supreme  test  of  the  psychic.  She  was 
absolutely  not  concerned  in  any  knoion  luay  with  that  movement. 
Save  for  a  ciu-ious  throbbing,  wave-like  motion  in  her  scalp,  she 
did  not  move.  If  she  lifted  the  horn,  it  was  by  the  exercise  of 
a  force  unrecognised  by  science.' 

"'Mitchell'  was  then  asked  if  it  would  not  be  possible  to 
produce  the  voices  through  the  cone  at  the  same  time  that  the 
psychic  was  being  held. 

"  He  seemed  to  hesitate,  and  at  last  said,  '  We  will  try.'  I 
perceived  in  his  tone  a  certain  doubt  and  indecision.  Again  we 
were  permitted  to  hold  the  psychic's  wrists,  and,  as  before,  the 
cone  was  lifted  and  drummed  upon  as  if  to  show  its  position 
high  in  the  air,  hut  no  voices  came.  Hidden  forces  seemed  to  be 
struggling  for  escape  beneath  our  hands,  and  with  a  sense  of 
some  baffling,  incredible,  externalisation  of  the  psychic's  nerve 
force,  I  could  well  understand  why  the  command  had  so  often 
been  given  not  to  touch  her  unbidden,  and  not  to  flash  a  sudden 
light. 

"  At  last  the  cone  dropped  upon  the  table,  and  we  resumed 
our  seats.  '  Maud  '  then  said  :  '  Mamma  will  waken  very  soon. 
Mr.  Mitchell  will  try  to  do  what  you  wish.'  .  .  .  Mrs.  Smiley 
seemed  to  pass  through  another  period  of  intense  suffering, 
moaning  and  gasping  more  piteously  than  before.  '  Maudie ' 
then  asked  us  to  sing  again,  and  put  her  mother  back  into 
deeper  sleep.  Shortly  after  this  the  tapping  came  again  upon 
the  cone,  and  '  Wilbur's '  strong  hand  grasped  and  lifted  it,  and 
his  voice — vigorous,  almost  full-toned — spoke  in  a  perfectly 
life-like  way,  and  while  his  voice  was  still  sounding,  the  psychic 
sighed  deeply  and  awoke  I 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  405 

" '  Is  anybody  here  ? '  she  asked,  in  her  natural  voice. 

"  Profoundly  surprised  at  the  sudden  change,  I  answered, 
*  Yes,  Wilbur  is  here  ;  at  least,  he  was  speaking  but  a  moment 
ago.'  .  .  .  Now  came  a  completely  mystifying  performance, 
and  an  overthrow  of  my  theory,  for  with  Mrs.  Smiley  perfectly 
normal,  mentally,  '  Wilbur,'  very  much  alive,  remained  at 
my  elbow  alert  to  perform.  His  activities  suffered  no  diminu- 
tion. He  went  about  his  pranks  with  greater  vigour  than  before, 
handling  the  cone  and  whisking  paper  and  pencil  about,  while 
Mrs.  Smiley  talked  freely  in  answer  to  my  questions,  seemingly 
quite  unconcerned  about  results.  A  singularly  engrossing  game 
of  hide-and-go-seek  now  began.  I  tried  every  expedient  to  get 
Mrs.  Smiley's  voice  and  that  of  the  '  spirit's '  at  the  same  time. 
But  never  did  I  succeed  in  getting  '  Wilbur's '  voice  at  precisely 
the  same  moment  with  her  own,  though  he  followed  swiftly  on 
her  speech,  interjecting  remarks  echoing  her  questions. 

*'  At  last  the  cone  dropped  to  the  table ;  it  was  apparently 
taken  up  by  another  hand,  and  '  Mitchell '  asked  :  '  What  can  I 
do  for  you,  Mr.  Garland  ?  ' 

" '  First  of  all,  I  want  the  privilege  of  going  to  the  psychic's 
chair  again,  in  order  to  hold  her  wrists  and  listen  at  her  lips. 
May  I  do  so  ? ' 

*' '  Mitchell '  did  not  reply,  but,  when  the  question  was  re- 
peated, three  faint  taps  on  the  cone  answered  'Yes.' 

"Leaving  my  seat  I  felt  my  way  to  Mrs.  Smiley's  side.  'I 
am  very  close  to  the  ultimate  mystery,  Mrs.  Smiley,'  I  said,  as 
I  placed  my  hand  upon  her  wrist.  '  Proceed,  Wilbur.  Let  me 
hear  your  voice  now.' 

"  With  tense  expectation,  I  put  my  ear  close  to  the  psychic's 
lips,  and  listened  breathlessly.  The  horn  soared  into  the  air, 
and  was  drummed  there  as  if  to  show  that  it  was  out  of  the 
reach  of  the  psychic,  hut  no  voice  came  from  it.  This  was  a  dis- 
appointment to  me,  and  I  said,  banteringly  :  '  You  know  this 
failure  is  suspicious,  Wilbur.  It  seems  to  prove  that  Mrs. 
Smiley  is  only  a  wonderful  ventriloquist,  after  all.  If  your 
vocal  organs  are  independent  of  hers,  show  it.' 

"  No  reply  came  to  this,  but,  while  my  hands  were  firmly 
pressed  upon  her  wrists  (both  sleeves  still  being  nailed  to  the 


406  DEATH 

chair)  the  loose  leaves  of  the  paper  in  the  centre  of  the  table 
were  whisked  away  to  the  left.  .  .  .  But  I  did  not  forget  my 
further  test.  '  Mrs.  Smiley,'  I  said,  .  .  .  '  I  want  to  place  my 
hand  over  your  lips,  or  to  muffle  you  in  some  way.  I  must  prove 
that  you  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  production  of  those  voices. 
Will  you  permit  this  test  ? ' 

"  '  Certainly,'  she  answered,  with  patient  sweetness.  '  You 
may  gag  me  in  any  way  you  want.'  .  .  .  So,  taking  a  large 
kerchief  from  my  pocket,  I  tied  it  tightly  around  her  mouth, 
knotting  it  at  the  back,  and  then  challenging  the  ghostly  one, 
'  Now,  Wilbur,  let's  hear  from  you.  Prove  your  psychic's 
innocence ! ' 

"  A  moment  later  the  voice  came  from  the  cone,  but  ap- 
parently very  much  muffled  and  blurred,  'That  is  easy.' 

" '  You  are  not  articulating  well,'  I  rather  sarcastically  ob- 
served. 

"  Instantly  the  voice  came  out  clearly,  more  sharply  than 
ever  before,  '  /  was  foolinfj  you  ! '  Upon  lighting  the  gas,  we 
found  our  victim  as  before,  sitting  absolutely  as  we  had  placed 
her.  The  table  edge  was  twenty-four  inches  from  her  finger 
tips.  The  place  where  the  cone  had  lain,  which  we  had  marked 
with  chalk  when  the  cone  was  first  drummed  upon,  was  thirty- 
six  inches  from  one  hand  and  forty  inches  from  the  other.  But 
most  inexplicable  of  all,  the  tangible  permanent  record  was  the 
seven  sheets  of  paper  that  we  found  lying  upon  a  couch  six  feet 
from  Mrs.  Smiley's  left  hand.  They  loere  all  loritten  upon  legibly, 
and  pinned  together  with  a  black  pin,  which  had  been  thrust  through 
the  writing."^  The  pencil  was  on  the  carpet  forty  inches  from 
Mrs.  Smiley's  hand.  The  leaves  of  paper,  at  the  moment  when 
they  were  grasped  and  lifted,  had  been  more  than  forty  inches 
from  her  finger  tips." 

2.  Raps. 

There  are  certain  cases  on  record  in  which  raps  have 
been  known  to  occur  in  the  presence  of  no  professional 
medium,   and  under  circumstances  that  are  practically 

^  The  italics  are  Mr.  Garland's. 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  407 

convincing.  Thus,  Dr.  J.  Maxwell,  in  his  Metapsychical 
Phenomena,  p.  278,  relates  a  case  in  which  raps  took 
place  out  of  doors,  in  the  presence  of  a  friend  of  his 
(not  a  professional  medium),  and  under  very  favourable 
circumstances.     He  says  : — 

*'The  raps  on  the  open  umbrella  are  extremely  curious.  We 
have  heard  raps  on  the  woodwork  and  on  the  silk  at  one  and 
the  same  time  ;  it  is  easy  to  perceive  that  the  shock  actually 
occurs  in  the  wood,  that  the  molecules  of  the  latter  are  set  in 
motion.  The  same  thing  occurs  in  the  silk ;  and  here  observa- 
tion is  even  more  interesting  still ;  each  rap  looks  like  a  drop  of 
some  invisible  liquid  falling  on  the  silk  from  a  respectable 
height.  The  stretched  silk  of  the  umbrella  is  quickly  and 
slightly  but  surely  dented  in ;  sometimes  the  force  with  which 
the  raps  are  given  is  such  as  to  shake  the  umbrella.  Nothing 
is  more  absorbing  than  the  observation  of  an  apparent  con- 
versation— by  means  of  the  umbrella — between  the  medium's 
personifications.  Raps,  imitating  a  burst  of  laughter  in  re- 
sponse to  the  observer's  remarks,  resound  on  the  silk,  like  the 
rapid  play  of  strong  but  tiny  fingers.  When  raps  on  the 
umbrella  are  forthcoming,  M.  Meurice  either  holds  the  handle 
of  the  umbrella,  or  some  one  else  does,  while  he  simply  touches 
the  handle  very  lightly  with  his  open  palm.  He  never  touches 
the  silk." 

This  personification  of  the  raps  has  been  observed 
on  several  occasions.  Again,  Dr.  Maxwell — who  has 
made  a  special  study  of  this  subject — says,  in  his  Meta- 
'psychical  Phenomena,  pp.  81—3  : — 

"  One  of  the  most  curious  facts  revealed  by  the  observation  of 
raps  is  their  relation  to  what  I  call  personification.  Each  per- 
sonified individuality  manifests  its  presence  by  special  raps. 
In  a  series  of  experiments  that  have  now  lasted  for  more  than 
two  years,  I  have  had  frequent  opportunities  of  studying  raps, 
personifying  diverse  entities.  Sometimes  the  raps  imitate  a 
burst  of  laughter ;  this  coincides  with  either  an  amusing  story 


408  DEATH 

related  by  one  of  the  sitters,  or  with  some  mild  teasing.  Not 
only  do  the  raps  reveal  themselves  as  the  productions  of 
intelligent  action,  they  also  manifest  intelligence  in  response 
to  any  particular  rhythm  or  code  which  might  be  suggested." 

Whatever  the  cause  and  nature  ot  these  raps,  there- 
fore, it  is  certain  that  there  is  some  intelligence  connected 
with  them  ;  and  that  intelligence  is  independent  either 
of  the  medium  or  of  the  sitter.  As  no  other  visible 
being  is  present,  the  intelligence  apparently  belongs  to 
an  mvisible  one ;  and  what  that  may  be  we  do  not 
pretend  to  say.  It  will  be  apparent  that  the  pheno- 
mena are  at  all  events  spiritistic  in  appearance,  like 
many  others,  no  matter  what  their  ultimate  explanation 
may  be. 


3.  The  Case  of  D.  D.  Home. 

As  there  are  comparatively  few  cases  in  which  any 
attempt  has  been  made  to  establish  the  question  of 
identity  by  means  of  the  so-called  physical  phenomena, 
such  manifestations  of  psychic  power,  interesting  though 
they  may  be  to  the  investigator,  are  worthy  of  but  little 
attention  in  a  work  of  this  character.  If  we  were  en- 
gaged in  a  thorough  examination  of  the  various  problems 
of  psychical  research,  we  might  feel  disposed  to  go  more 
deeply  into  the  mysteries  of  alleged  telekinesis,  but 
when,  as  is  the  case,  the  interest  centres  entirely  around 
the  question  of  identity,  the  reports  pertaining  to  levi- 
tations,  materialisation,  and  other  exhibitions  of  ab- 
normal physical  force  may  be  disposed  of  with  the 
briefest  possible  mention. 

In  the  case  of  D.  D.  Home,  therefore,  there  are  com- 
paratively few  facts  that  need  be  included  in  these  pages, 
for  while  he  stands  practically  alone  among  professional 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  409 

mediums,  being  the  only  producer  of  physical  phenomena 
who  has  never  been  exposed,  or  caught  in  some  act  of 
trickery,  the  manifestations  of  his  power  have,  almost 
without  exception,  been  of  a  character  in  which  the 
question  of  identity  could  not  naturally  enter.  That 
his  phenomena  are  of  a  most  mystifying  order,  however, 
there  can  be  no  question.  Even  Mr.  Podmore,  who  was 
none  too  ready  to  grant  the  existence  of  supernormal 
forces,  was  willing  to  admit  that  there  is  no  valid  evidence 
upon  which  to  base  a  suspicion  against  this  medium.^ 
In  the  first  place,  Home  invariably  sat  in  the  circle, 
side  by  side  with  the  other  sitters.  Moreover,  he  always 
exhibited  a  great  objection  to  darkness,  insisting  upon 
having  as  much  light  as  possible,  and,  on  one  occasion 
at  least,  he  offered  to  change  his  clothes  just  before  the 
stance  to  prove  that  he  had  brought  no  mechanism,  or 
paraphernalia  concealed  about  his  person.  In  fact,  the 
most  searching  investigation  that  such  men  as  Lord 
Adare  and  Sir  William  Crookes  were  able  to  make 
disclosed  nothing  that  seemed  to  warrant  the  assumption 
that  the  phenomena  which  he  produced  were  not  genuine, 
at  least  so  far  as  conscious  fraud  on  the  part  of  the  medium 
was  concerned.  Even  the  severe  scientific  tests  devised 
by  these  well-trained  investigators  produced  no  other 
result  than  to  indicate  that,  as  Sir  William  Crookes  says, 
in  his  Researches  in  Modern  Spiritualism,  they  apparently 
demonstrated  the  existence  of  some  force  which  was  able 
to  move  objects  in  a  supernormal  manner. 

So  far  as  the  extraordinary  levitations  and  other 
exhibitions  of  telekinesis  are  concerned,  readers  who  are 
interested  in  such  phenomena  will  find  these  wonders 
fully  described  in  many  books  on  psychical  investigation, 
including  Sir  William  Crookes'  Researches,  and  the  Pro- 
ceedings of   the    {London)    Society  for    Psychical  Research. 

1  Modern  Spiritualism,  vol.  ii.,  p.  230. 


410  DEATH 

It  is  from  these  sources  that  we  have  obtained  the  fol- 
lowing facts  in  regard  to  the  famous  "  accordion  test." 

It  is  stated  that  Home  took  an  ordinary  accordion 
by  the  end  furthest  from  the  keys,  and  that,  while  hold- 
ing it  in  that  manner  beneath  the  table,  the  accordion 
commenced  to  play.  All  who  were  present  were  per- 
mitted to  look  under  the  table,  when  they  saw  the 
instrument  open  and  close,  the  keys  rising  and  falling, 
exactly  as  though  some  unseen  hands  were  fingering  them. 
After  describing  this  experiment,  and  assuring  the  reader 
that  music  was  obtained  even  when  all  eyes  were  fixed 
upon  the  instrument.  Sir  William  Crookes  continued : — 

"But  the  sequel  was  still  more  surprising,  for  Mr.  Home 
then  removed  his  hand  altogether  from  the  accordion,  and 
placed  it  in  the  hand  of  the  person  next  to  him.  The  instru- 
ment then  continued  to  play,  no  person  touching  it,  and  no 
hand  being  near  it.  The  accordion  was  now  again  taken  with- 
out any  visible  touch  from  Mr.  Home's  hand,  which  he  removed 
from  it  entirely  and  placed  upon  the  table,  where  it  was  taken 
by  the  person  next  to  him,  and  seen,  as  now  were  both  his 
hands,  by  all  present." 

As  a  further  test,  Sir  William  devised  a  wire  cage, 
circular  in  shape,  and  composed  of  laths  of  wood,  fastened 
together  at  the  top  and  bottom,  and  with  wire  encircling 
it  in  twenty-four  rounds,  the  openings  being  less  than  an 
inch  apart.  In  other  words,  while  this  cage  would  hold 
the  accordion  easily,  it  was  impossible  to  turn  the  in- 
strument after  it  had  been  put  in  it,  while  the  hand  that 
held  the  accordion  in  the  cage  could  in  no  manner  reach 
the  keys.  To  further  prevent  the  possibility  of  outside 
communication,  the  wires  that  passed  around  the  cage 
were  charged  with  electricity  from  a  battery  situated 
in  the  next  room.  In  spite  of  these  precautions,  however, 
the  instrument  continued  to  play.     Sir  William  says : — 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  411 

"I  and  two  of  the  others  present  saw  the  accordion  distinctly 
floating  about  inside  the  cage  with  no  visible  support.  I 
grasped  Mr.  Home's  arm  below  the  elbow,  and  gently  slid  my 
hand  down  until  I  touched  the  top  of  the  accordion.  He  was 
not  moving  a  muscle.  His  other  hand  was  on  the  table, 
visible  to  all,  and  his  feet  were  under  the  feet  of  those  next 
to  him." 

On  another  occasion, 

"  The  accordion  was  held  by  Mr.  Home  in  the  usual  position 
under  the  table.  Whilst  it  played,  Mrs.  I.  looked  beneath  and 
saw  it  playing.  Mr.  Home  removed  his  hand  altogether  from 
it,  and  held  both  hands  above  the  table.  During  this  Mrs.  I. 
said  she  saw  a  luminous  hand  playing  the  accordion." 

This  mention  of  a  luminous  hand  brings  us  to  a  very 
interesting  phenomenon,  one  that  has  been  frequently 
attested  in  Home's  case,  however.  We  refer  to  the 
"  dematerialisation  "  of  hands  while  they  are  being  held 
by  the  sitter.  Sir  William  Crookes  mentions  this  on 
several  occasions,  and  not  only  casually,  but  very  em- 
phatically. (See  Journal  of  the  Society  for  Psychical 
Research,  vol.  vi.,  p.  342.)  There  he  says:  "The  hands 
were  warm  and  lifelike,  and  if  retained  would  appear  to 
melt  in  one's  grasp.  They  were  never  dragged  away." 
Other  witnesses  speak  to  like  effect.  Thus,  Mr.  H.  D. 
Jencken,  in  a  paper  read  before  the  London  Dialectical 
Society,  said:  "Spirit  hands  are  usually  luminous,  and 
appear  and  re-appear  all  but  instantaneously.  I  have 
once  been  enabled  to  submit  a  spirit  hand  to  pressure. 
The  temperature  was,  as  far  as  I  could  judge,  the  same 
as  that  of  the  room,  and  the  spirit  hand  felt  soft,  velvety, 
dissolving  slowly  under  the  greatest  amount  of  pressure 
to  which  I  could  submit  it."  {Be'povt,  p.  120.)  Dr.  A.  D. 
Wilson  and  Professor  Mapes  testify  to  like  effect.  (See 
R.  D.  Owen,  Delateable  Land,  pp.  351-2;  also  Hardinge, 
Modern  American  Spiritualism,  p.  106.) 


412  DEATH 

It  would  seem  that  we  have  here,  then,  an  indication 
of  an  external  spiritual  being ;  for  the  phenomena,  if  not 
the  result  of  hallucination  pure  and  simple  (it  certainly 
could  not  have  been  fraud  on  many  occasions,  for  these 
hands  were  clearly  seen,  when  Home  was  also  seen 
in  another  part  of  the  room),  do  not  point  to  any 
"  unknown  force "  as  an  explanation,  but  to  an  entity, 
having  a  body,  and  a  volition  of  its  own.  Certainly 
the  phenomena  are  sufficiently  startling  to  warrant  a 
certain  amount  of  scepticism,  but  the  only  rational 
way  out  of  the  difficulty,  apparently,  is  to  suppose  that 
hallucination  of  the  sitters  took  place.  This  hypothesis 
has  been  advanced  and  defended  from  time  to  time  by 
various  writers,  notably  Mr.  Podmore,  and  more  recently 
by  Miss  Alice  Johnson  in  her  reply  to  Count  Solovovo 
(vide  Proceedings  of  the  Society  for  Psychical  Research,  vol. 
xxi.,  pp.  436-515).  But  the  objections  that  have  been 
raised  to  the  theory  still  hold  good  :  (1)  that  several 
persons,  all  apparently  normal,  saw  the  hands  at  the 
same  time;  and  (2)  that  the  hands  often  moved  various 
articles  from  place  to  place,  and  they  were  found  to 
have  been  actually  moved  after  the  seance  ended. 
Unless  we  are  prepared  to  admit  that  a  hallucination 
of  a  hand  can  move  a  material  object,  it  would  be  very 
difficult  to  account  for  many  of  the  Home  phenomena  on 
any  other  theory  than  that  an  actual  hand  of  some  semi- 
material  substance  was  present  and  active,  producing 
observed  phenomena.^ 

4.  William  Stainton  Moses. 

The  case  of  William  Stainton  Moses  is  of  particular 
interest,  as  bearing  upon  the  question  of  the  reality  of 

1  See  a  criticism  of  the  hallucination  theory  by  one  of  us  (Mr. 
Carrington)  in  the  Journal  of  the  American  Society  for  Psychical  Research 
December  1909,  pp.  711-27. 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  413 

physical  phenomena,  of  the  spiritualistic  type.  Stainton 
Moses  was  born  in  1839,  received  an  excellent  education 
at  Oxford,  and  in  1863  accepted  a  curacy  in  the  Isle  of 
Man.  He  continued  his  clerical  duties  for  several  years, 
being  generally  loved  by  his  parishioners,  and  gained  for 
himself  an  excellent  personal  reputation.  Coming  to 
London  in  1870,  he  obtained  the  appointment  of  master 
oi  English  in  the  University  College  School,  which 
position  he  held  until  1889.  Encountering  by  chance 
Dale  Owen's  book,  The  DebateaUe  Land,  he  read  it  with 
interest,  and  finally  became  a  student  of  spiritualistic 
philosophy.  He  investigated  various  mediums,  and 
soon  found  that  he  was  possessed  of  mediumistic 
capacity  himself.  He  then  rapidly  developed  into  a 
remarkable  medium,  continuing,  however,  his  work  at 
the  University  College  for  a  number  of  years,  until  he 
resigned  to  become  editor  of  Light,  the  official  Spiritualistic 
paper. 

The  phenomena  occurring  in  the  presence  of  Moses 
were  both  physical  and  mental  in  their  character.  Much 
automatic  writing  was  received,  some  of  it  of  a  distinctly 
evidential  character.  Many  of  these  messages,  apparently 
establishing  personal  identity,  were  published  in  his  book, 
Spirit  Identity.  But,  further,  a  great  number  of  re- 
markable physical  phenomena  are  alleged  to  have  taken 
place  in  his  presence.  Raps,  which  intelligently  answered 
questions ;  lights,  varied  in  character,  and  often  remark- 
able for  their  brilliancy ;  scents  of  various  descriptions ; 
cold  breezes ;  musical  sounds  of  all  kinds  (sometimes 
resembling  the  chords  of  an  organ,  at  other  times  those 
of  a  harmonium  ;  bells,  notes  of  various  wind  instru- 
ments, horns,  &c.),  being  some  of  the  phenomena  which 
are  recorded  to  have  occurred  at  his  seances.  Direct  writ- 
ing was  received  on  slates  and  on  paper.  Movements  of 
light  and  of  heavy  objects,  without  contact,  and  without 


414  DEATH 

apparent  cause,  the  supposed  passage  of  matter  through 
matter,  direct  voices,  levitations,  &c.,  formed  only  a  part 
of  the  manifestations  that  occurred  in  this  gentleman's 
presence.  Incredible  as  they  may  appear,  they  have 
never  been  satisfactorily  explained,  and  there  is  no 
reason  whatever  for  supposing  that  Moses  would  produce 
these  phenomena  by  fraudulent  means.  He  was  not  a 
professional  medium,  but  a  gentleman  moving  in  good 
social  circles  in  London ;  he  received  no  money  for  the 
seances,  which  were  not  public,  only  a  few  of  his  personal 
friends  being  allowed  to  attend  these  sittings.  The  records 
of  these  seances  were  never  published  in  Mr.  Moses' 
lifetime,  so  that  the  love  of  notoriety  cannot  be  urged 
as  a  justifiable  reason  for  his  resorting  to  fraud  on  these 
occasions.  Difficult  as  it  may  be  to  believe  in  their 
reality,  it  is  almost  equally  difficult  to  believe  that  Mr. 
Moses  resorted  to  a  few  petty  tricks  in  order  to  deceive 
his  personal  friends  for  a  number  of  years !  As  Mr. 
Lang  so  well  put  it,  "  the  choice  is  between  a  moral  and 
a  physical  miracle ; "  and  there  the  matter  may  be  said 
to  rest  to  this  day. 

5.  EusAPiA  Palladino. 

So  much  has  been  written  of  late  concerning  the 
Italian  medium  Eusapia  Palladino  that  we  feel  it  is 
unnecessary  to  do  more  than  refer  our  readers  to  the 
sources  from  which  the  information  relating  to  this 
medium  is  drawn — chiefly  Mr.  Carrington's  Eusapia 
Palladino  and  her  Phenomena,  M.  Flammarion's  book, 
Mysterious  Psychic  Forces,  and  to  the  Annals  of  Psychical 
Science}     We  shall  quote  one  or  two  typical  seances  from 

1  It  is  extremely  interesting  and  significant  to  note,  in  this  connection, 
that  many  of  the  Italian  investigators  have  progressed  so  far,  and  are  now 
so  certain  of  the  facts,  that  they  are  treating  the  phenomena  obtained  in 
the  presence  of  Eusapia  Palladino  as  proved  for  science,  and  now  speak  of 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  415 

each.  Professor  Porro,  successively  Director  of  the 
Observatories  of  Genoa  and  Turin,  and  then  Director  of 
the  National  Observatory  of  the  Argentine  Republic, 
writes  concerning  one  of  his  sittings  as  follows : — 

"The  tenth  sitting  (the  last)  was  one  of  the  best  attended  and 
was  perhaps  the  most  interesting  of  all. 

*'  Scarcely  had  the  electric  lights  been  extinguished  when  we 
remark  an  automatic  movement  of  the  chair  upon  which  a  lump 
of  plaster  had  been  placed,  while  the  hands  and  feet  of  Eusapia 
are  carefully  controlled  by  me  and  by  No.  3.  However,  as  we 
wish  to  forestall  the  objection  of  the  critics  that  the  phenomena 
take  place  in  the  dark,  she  typtologically  (that  is,  by  taps)  asks 
for  light,  and  the  experimenters  light  the  electric  lamp. 

"  Presently  all  the  company  see  the  chair  on  which  the  lump 
of  plaster  lies  (not  at  all  a  light  chair),  moving  between  myself 
and  the  medium,  without  our  being  able  to  understand  the 
determining  cause  of  the  movement. 

"Madame  Palladino  puts  her  outspread  hand  upon  the  back 
of  the  chair,  and  her  left  above  it.  When  our  hands  rise  up, 
the  chair  rises  also  without  contact,  reaching  a  height  of  about 
six  inches.  This  performance  is  several  times  repeated,  with 
the  addition  of  the  intervention  of  the  hand  of  No.  5,  under 
conditions  of  light  and  of  control  which  leave  nothing  to  be 
desired. 

"  The  room  is  again  almost  completely  darkened  ...  a 
current  of  cold  air  upon  the  table  preceded  the  arrival  of  a  little 
branch  with  two  green  leaves.  We  know  that  there  are  no 
plants  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the  company.  It  appears  that 
we  have  here  a  case  of  '  bringing  in '  from  the  outside. 

"  No.  3  is  greatly  exhausted  from  the  heat.     And  lo  !  a  hand, 

"  unexplored  regions  of  human  biology"  instead  of  mediumistic  pheno- 
mena, when  discussing  her  case !  In  other  words,  they  think  that  the 
problem  is  now  a  definite  biological  problem,  and  as  such  comes  within 
the  recognised  and  legitimate  field  of  science.  They  believe  that  these 
phenomena  can  no  longer  be  treated  as  mediumistic  freaks,  or  oddities  of 
Nature,  any  more  than  they  can  be  disposed  of  with  a  wave  of  the  hand,  as 
"  all  humbug."  This  recognition  and  classification  of  the  facts  is  certainly 
most  significant. 


416  DEATH 

which  takes  his  handkerchief  from  his  neck  and  with  it  dries 
the  perspiration  on  his  face.  He  tries  to  seize  the  handkerchief 
with  his  teeth,  but  it  is  snatched  from  him.  A  big  hand  lifts 
his  left  hand,  and  makes  him  rap  several  strokes  with  it  on 
the  table. 

"  Gleams  of  light  begin  to  appear,  at  first  on  the  right  hand 
of  No.  5,  then  in  different  parts  of  the  hall.  They  are  perceived 
by  everybody. 

"  The  curtain  is  inflated  as  if  it  were  pushed  against  by  a 
strong  wind,  and  touches  No.  11,  who  is  sitting  in  a  small  easy- 
chair  a  yard  and  a  half  from  the  medium.  The  same  person  is 
touched  by  a  hand,  while  another  hand  pulls  a  fan  from  an 
nside  pocket  of  his  jacket,  carries  it  to  No.  5,  and  then  to 
No.  11.  The  fan  is  soon  returned  to  its  owner,  and  is  moved 
to  and  fro  above  our  heads,  to  the  great  satisfaction  of  all  of  us. 
A  tobacco-pouch  is  taken  from  the  pocket  of  No.  3.  The  In- 
visible empties  it  on  the  table,  and  then  gives  it  to  No.  10. 
Various  stems  of  plants  drop  upon  the  table. 

"Transfers  of  the  fan  from  one  hand  to  another  begin  again. 
Then  No.  11  believes  that  he  ought  to  announce  that  the  fan 
had  been  offered  to  him  by  a  young  girl  who  had  expressed  the 
wish  that  it  be  transferred  to  No.  11,  then  given  back  to  No.  5. 
Nobody  knew  of  this  except  No.  11. 

"  No.  5,  who  at  present  occupies  the  arm-chair,  where 
formerly  No.  1 1  was  seated,  a  yard  and  a  half  from  the  medium, 
feels  the  edge  of  the  curtain  touching  him,  and  then  perceives 
the  presence  of  the  body  of  a  woman  whose  hair  rests  on 
his  head. 

"  The  seance  is  adjourned  about  one  o'clock. 

"  At  the  moment  of  parting  Eusapia  sees  a  bell  on  the  piano ; 
she  extends  her  hand  ;  the  bell  glides  along  on  the  piano,  turns 
over,  and  falls  on  the  floor.  The  experiment  is  renewed,  in  full 
light  as  before,  the  hand  of  the  medium  remaining  several 
inches  from  the  bell.  .  .  ." 

The  following  case  is  perhaps  one  of  the  best  attested, 
and  at  the  same  time  one  of  the  most  remarkable  stances 
witnessed  in  the  presence  of  this  medium.     The  incident 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  417 

here  quoted  occurred  during  a  seance  held  with  Eusapia, 
under  the  supervision  of  Professor  P.  Foa,  Professor  of 
Pathological  Anatomy  ol  the  University  of  Turin,  and 
Drs.  A.  Herlitzka,  C.  Foa,  and  A.  Aggazzofcti,  assistants 
of  Professor  Mosso,  the  eminent  physiologist.  The  record 
reads,  in  part,  as  follows  : — 

"A  luminous  interlude  ensued:  above  Eusapia's  head,  at  a 
height  of  about  18  inches,  all  the  sitters  saw  a  bright  light 
appear,  similar  to  that  of  a  small  electric  pocket  lamp.  One 
of  us  (Dr.  Foa)  went  out  of  the  circle,  and  held  a  photographic 
plate  above  the  medium's  head  to  find  out  whether  it  was  pos- 
sible to  register  the  radiations.  A  few  moments  later  the 
bright  light,  well  localised,  reappeared  ;  immediately  afterwards 
the  toy  piano,  which  was  on  the  table  all  the  time  with  the 
keyboard  turned  away  from  the  medium,  made  a  few  sounds ; 
the  sitters  observed  the  spontaneous  depression  of  the  keys 
which  accompanied  the  sounds. 

"  Still  with  the  object  of  obtaining  a  record  of  possible  radia- 
tions, one  of  us  (Dr.  Foa)  held  the  photographic  plate,  wrapped 
in  paper,  over  Eusapia's  head,  and  he  felt  the  plate  seized  by  a 
hand  covered  with  the  curtain ;  he  passed  one  hand  behind  the 
curtain,  but  found  nothing  there. 

"The  hand  (for  reasons  that  will  appear  later  we  apply  this 
term  to  the  force  that  acted  on  the  plate,  although  no  form  of  a 
hand  was  visible)  made  an  effort  to  seize  the  plate  by  snatching  it 
unexpectedly,  and  renewed  this  attempt  repeatedly,  but  without 
success.  Dr.  Foa  seized  the  hand  which  was  covered  with  the 
curtain,  and  had  the  impression  of  pressing  real  fingers;  the 
fingers  escaped  him,  however,  and  gave  him  a  blow ;  the  plate 
was  changed,  and  the  invisible  hand  began  another  struggle, 
during  which  it  had  tight  hold  of  the  plate  for  several  seconds. 
At  last  a  sudden  blow  given  to  the  plate  caused  it  to  fall  on  the 
stance  table  without  breaking.  Dr  Aggazzotti,  who  held 
another  plate  over  the  medium's  head,  had  in  his  turn  to 
struggle  in  order  to  prevent  its  escaping  him — a  struggle  in 
the  course    of  which  his  hand  was  even  bitten ! 

2d 


418  DEATH 

•'  At  this  juncture  the  medium  told  Professor  Pio  Foa  not  to 
be  alarmed  whatever  might  happen,  and  advised  all  present  not 
to  touch  the  objects  which  would  be  suspended  in  the  air,  other- 
wise she  would  be  unable  to  restrain  the  movements,  and  might 
hurt  somebody. 

"  Table  Ko.  1  rose  in  the  air  many  inches  high,  and  passed 
once  over  the  head  of  Professor  Foa  ;  returning  to  the  ground, 
and,  keeping  all  the  time  outside  the  cabinet,  it  turned  over, 
and  then  stood  up  again. 

"  Needless  to  say  that  the  controllers  were  always  vigilant,  and 
that  the  hands  and  the  feet  of  the  medium  were  always  held  in 
our  hands  and  under  our  feet.  Often  during  the  occurrence  of 
the  most  important  phenomena,  Eusapia's  legs  were  placed 
horizontally  on  our  knees. 

"  After  table  No.  1  had  stood  upright,  Dr.  Arullani  approached 
it,  but  the  piece  of  furniture,  moving  violently  towards  him, 
repulsed  him;  Dr.  Arullani  seized  the  table,  which  was  heard 
to  crack  in  the  struggle :  it  was  a  strong  table  of  white  wood, 
about  2  feet  9  inches  high  and  3  feet  long  by  22  inches  broad, 
weighing  17  pounds. 

"  Dr.  Arullani  asked  that  the  hand  behind  the  curtain  should 
grasp  his.  The  medium  replied  in  her  own  voice,  '  First  I  am 
going  to  break  the  table,  then  I  will  give  you  a  grasp  of  the 
hand.'  This  declaration  was  followed  by  three  fresh,  complete 
levitations  of  the  table,  which  fell  back  each  time  heavily  on  the 
floor.  All  those  who  were  on  the  left  of  the  medium  could 
observe,  by  a  very  good  red  light,  the  various  movements  of  the 
table.  The  latter  bent  down  and  passed  behind  the  curtain, 
followed  by  one  of  us  (Dr.  0.  Foa),  who  saw  it  turn  over  and  rest 
on  one  of  its  two  short  sides,  whilst  one  of  the  legs  came  off 
violently,  as  if  under  the  action  of  some  force  pressing  upon  it. 
At  this  moment  the  table  came  violently  out  of  the  cabinet,  and 
continued  to  break  up  under  the  eyes  of  every  one  present.  At  first 
its  different  parts  were  torn  off,  then  the  boards  themselves 
went  to  pieces.  Two  legs,  which  still  remained  united  by  a 
thin  slip  of  wood,  floated  above  us  and  placed  themselves  on  the 
stance  table. 

"  The  medium  said,  '  Unhappy  owners  of  the  house  ! '     As 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  419 

the  medium  had  thus  kept  her  promise  to  break  the  table, 
Dr.  Arullani  asked  for  the  handshake,  and  was  invited  by  the 
medium  to  approach  the  curtain.  He  had  hardly  reached  it 
when  he  felt  himself  hit  by  pieces  of  wood  and  hands,  and  we 
all  heard  the  noise  of  the  blows. 

"  One  of  us,  who  was  in  control,  felt  himself  tickled  under  the 
arm,  but  could  not  see  any  hand,  although  the  subjective  im- 
pression was  of  four  fingers  which  moved  rapidly  under  the 
armpits. 

"  During  the  whole  stance  the  condition  of  the  medium  and 
her  power  were  being  discussed.  Dr.  Arullani  maintained  that 
this  force  was  only  manifested  at  a  few  inches'  distance.  The 
medium  then  told  him  to  stand  upon  the  seance  table.  Dr. 
Arullani  confined  himself  to  kneeling  upon  it,  and  was  struck 
on  the  head  by  a  piece  of  wood  :  then  two  feet  of  the  table  were 
raised  three  times,  the  third  time  more  violently,  and  the  doctor 
was  sent  rolling  over  to  the  ground. 

"  The  seance  approached  its  close  ;  the  medium  seemed  very 
tired ;  she  leaned  her  head  on  the  shoulder  of  one  of  the  con- 
trollers. A  very  interesting  experience  was  yet  in  store  for  us. 
The  medium,  as  well  as  all  the  sitters,  who  formed  a  chain, 
stood  up.  The  table  moved  towards  the  centre  of  the  room,  and 
afterwards  rose  completely  in  the  air.  After  a  brief  pause, 
during  which  one  of  us  mentioned  the  fact  that  a  photographic 
plate  was  fixed  under  the  seance  table,  and  whilst  every  one 
was  standing  up  at  some  distance  from  the  table,  which  was 
free  and  quite  visible  on  all  sides,  the  medium  asked  for  Dr. 
Aggazzotti's  hand,  and  immediately  afterwards  the  photographic 
plate  was  seen  to  fall  with  violence  on  to  the  seance  table. 
Dr.  C.  Foa  and  Dr.  Aggazzotti  saw  it  distinctly  come  out  from 
under  the  table,  move  round  the  edge,  and  pass  on  to  the  upper 
surface. 

"  It  was  1  A.M. ;  the  medium  was  asked  whether  the  stance 
should  be  closed,  but  she  did  not  reply  :  she  was  seen  to  be  very 
fatigued,  and  we  broke  off  the  stance  without  further  demur  ; 
the  medium  was  placed  in  an  arm-chair,  and  carried  to  a  small 
adjoining  sitting-room." 


420  DEATH 

On  returning  to  the  field  of  battle,  it  was  found  that 
the  table  was  broken  into  small  pieces  of  various  sizes. 
On  the  indiarubber  membrane,  covered  with  lamp  black, 
was  found  the  mark  of  the  stuff  which  had  been  torn 
only  in  some  of  the  places ;  and  on  one  of  the  plates  was 
the  impression  of  a  thumb  and  fingers.  Evidently,  there- 
fore, the  results  obtained  at  this  sitting  were  objective, 
and  cannot  be  attributed  to  hallucination. 

The  final  case  we  quote  is  one  of  peculiar  interest,  as 
it  involves  personal  identity  and  supernormally  acquired 
information,  as  well  as  the  mere  physical  phenomena. 
It  is  reported  at  first  hand,  immediately  after  the  sitting, 
by  Dr.  Joseph  Venzano,  whom  Professor  Morselli  states 
to  be  "  an  excellent  observer."     He  says : — 

"  In  spite  of  the  dimness  of  the  light,  I  could  distinctly  see 
Madame  Palladino  and  my  fellow-sitters.  Suddenly  I  perceived 
that  behind  me  was  a  form,  fairly  tall,  which  was  leaning  its 
head  on  my  left  shoulder  and  sobbing  violently,  so  that  those 
present  could  hear  the  sobs  ;  it  kissed  me  repeatedly.  I  clearly 
perceived  the  outlines  of  this  face,  which  touched  my  own,  and 
I  felt  the  very  fine  and  abundant  hair  in  contact  with  my  left 
cheek,  so  that  I  could  be  quite  sure  that  it  was  a  woman.  The 
table  then  began  to  move,  and  by  typtology  gave  the  name  of 
a  close  family  connection  who  was  known  to  no  one  present 
except  myself.  She  had  died  some  time  before,  and  on  account 
of  incompatibility  of  temperament  there  had  been  serious  dis- 
agreements with  her.  I  was  so  far  from  expecting  this  typto- 
logical  response  that  I  at  first  thought  that  it  was  a  case  of 
coincidence  of  name ;  but  whilst  I  was  mentally  forming  this 
reflection  I  felt  a  mouth,  with  warm  breath,  touch  my  ear,  and 
whisper  in  a  low  voice  in  Genoese  dialect  a  succession  of  sentences, 
the  murmur  of  which  was  audible  to  the  sitters.  These  sen- 
tences were  broken  by  bursts  of  weeping,  and  their  gist  was  to 
repeatedly  implore  pardon  for  injuries  done  to  me,  with  a  ful- 
ness of  detail  connected  with  family  affairs  which  could  only  be 
known  to  the  person  in  question.     The  phenomenon  seemed  so 


riiotograph  of  Andre's  body  in  the  coffin,  taken  at  G  r.M., 
nine  hours  after  death  (p.  3G8). 


riioiujjraph  ul'  Madame  Baraduc,  taken  a  quarter  of  an  hour 
after  death  (p.  369). 


Photograph  of  Madame  Baraduc,  taken  at  3  r.M.,  a  bare  hour 
after  death  (p.  370). 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  421 

real  that  I  felt  compelled  to  reply  to  the  excuses  offered  me 
with  expressions  of  affection,  and  to  ask  pardon  in  return  if 
my  resentment  of  the  wrongs  referred  to  had  been  excessive. 
But  I  had  scarcely  uttered  the  first  syllables  when  two  hands, 
with  exquisite  delicacy,  applied  themselves  to  my  lips  and  pre- 
vented my  continuing.  The  form  then  said  to  me,  '  Thank 
you,'  embraced  me,  kissed  me,  and  disappeared." 

It  will  be  seen  that,  in  the  above  account,  the  medium 
was  awake  and  not  in  a  trance  ;  and  further,  and  still  more 
important,  she  was  distinctly  visible  to  Dr.  Yenzano  and 
to  all  the  circle,  and  remained  so  throughout  the  whole 
of  the  phenomena.  Whatever  theory  we  may  choose  to 
explain  these  facts,  it  is  certain  that  neither  fraud  nor 
hallucination  alone  will  suffice.  Certain  it  is  also  that 
the  spiritistic  interpretation  is  the  simplest  and  would 
seem  the  only  one  capable  of  explaining  all  the  facts. 
However,  we  leave  this  question  of  theories  and  inter- 
pretations for  discussion  at  some  later  time,  as  they  are 
somewhat  out  of  place  in  a  work  of  this  character. 

Not  unnaturally,  perhaps,  we  regard  as  amongst  the 
most  conclusive  experiments,  so  far  conducted,  those  in 
which  one  of  us  (H.  Carrington)  participated.  In  the 
autumn  of  1908  he  found  himself  in  London,  and  there 
met  the  Hon.  Everard  Feilding  and  Mr.  W.  W.  Baggally, 
both  members  of  the  Council  of  the  English  Society  for 
Psychical  Research.  The  three  journeyed  to  Naples,  and 
there  obtained  a  series  of  sittings  with  Eusapia  Palladino. 
It  would  be  impossible  in  this  place  to  detail  these 
sittings,  as  the  reports  are  extremely  laborious  and 
lengthy ;  we  must  content  ourselves  with  a  summary 
of  the  degree  of  control  maintained  throughout  the 
sittings,  and  a  general  description  of  the  phenomena 
obtained.  This  will  at  least  give  the  reader  an  idea  of 
the  precautions  observed  and  of  the  manifestations  that 
occurred.     (For  the  details  of  these  sittings,  we  would 


422  DEATH 

refer  the  reader  to  Proceedwigs  of  the  Society  for  Psychical 
Research,  vol.  xxiii.,  pp.  306-569  ;  and  to  the  book, 
Eusapia  Falladino  and  her  Phenomena,  by  Hereward 
Carrington.) 

The  conditions  under  which  the  seances  took  place 
were  as  follows  : — The  sittings  were  held  in  our  own 
rooms  at  the  Hotel  Victoria,  Naples.  Before  each  seance 
the  rooms  were  carefully  searched,  and  the  instruments, 
&c.,  inspected.  The  room  was  situated  on  the  fifth  floor, 
the  windows  opening  out  on  to  the  street.  After  the 
medium  had  entered  the  room,  every  door  and  window 
was  carefully  locked  and  bolted.  On  several  occasions 
the  medium  was  carefully  searched,  and  nothing  suspicious 
was  found  upon  her  person  or  in  her  clothing.  In  fact, 
she  offered  to  wear  another  dress  if  the  investigators  cared 
to  provide  her  with  one.  Confederates  were  certainly 
not  present.  It  became  simply  a  question  of  whether 
or  not  the  medium  could  produce  these  results  herself 
and  unaided.  It  depended  upon  her  "  controllers,"  then, 
so  to  hold  and  secure  her  that  it  was  impossible  for  her 
to  produce  the  phenomena  herself. 

In  one  corner  of  the  stance  room  two  thin  black 
curtains  were  hung,  forming  a  "  cabinet,"  in  which  were 
placed  a  small  table  containing  a  tea-bell,  a  toy  piano,  a 
tambourine,  a  tin  trumpet,  a  guitar,  &c.  Nothing  else  was 
placed  in  the  cabinet  except  some  cakes  of  wet  clay  at 
the  later  seances,  upon  which,  it  was  hoped,  the  ''  spirits  " 
would  impress  their  hands  or  faces.  The  cabinet  was 
examined  just  before  each  stance  and  found  to  be  empty. 
Moreover,  during  each  sitting  one  of  the  investigators 
frequently  lifted  the  curtains  of  the  cabinet  and  looked 
inside.  Nothing  was  visible  except  the  phenomena  which 
were  taking  place  at  the  time  ! 

The  medium  sat  outside  this  curtain,  and  about  a  foot 
or  eighteen  inches  from  it.      In  front  of  her  was  placed 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  423 

the  stance  table  ;  and  on  either  side  of  her  sat  one  investi- 
gator or  "  controller/'  whose  duty  it  was  to  see  that  the 
hand,  foot,  and  knee  on  his  side  were  firmly  held  or  con- 
trolled. Other  sitters  sat  round  the  table  in  positions 
which  enabled  them  to  see  what  was  taking  place.  The 
light  was  regulated  so  that  it  could  be  varied  from  a 
bright  white  light  (sufficiently  good  to  enable  the  sitters 
to  read  small  print  with  ease)  to  a  light  so  faint  that  one 
could  distinguish  only  the  faces  of  the  sitters  round  the 
table.  These  preliminaries  settled,  the  seance  com- 
menced.    Let  us  now  turn  to  the  method  of  control. 

The  hands  and  feet  of  the  medium  were  held  away 
from  one  another  and  usually  separated  a  foot  or  more, 
so  that  approximation  or  substitution  was  impossible. 
Often  one  hand  was  held  in  the  lap,  the  other  on  the 
table.  Frequently  the  whole  arm  was  under  complete 
control  as  far  as  the  shoulder.  The  head  of  the  medium 
was  visible  to  all  throughout  the  sittings.  The  knees 
were  constantly  held  by  the  hands  of  the  controllers. 
The  feet  of  the  medium  were  placed  upon  the  feet  of 
her  controllers,  on  either  side  of  her,  or  were  held  under 
theirs.  Often  they  were  tied  to  the  rungs  of  her  chair 
with  rope.  Several  times  one  of  the  sitters  w^ould  go 
beneath  the  table  and  hold  her  ankles  in  his  hands, 
while  the  other  controllers  paid  particular  attention  to 
the  hands,  knees,  and  head.  On  several  occasions  the 
whole  body  of  the  medium  was  under  complete  control, 
for,  when  she  passed  into  a  deep  trance  state,  she  leaned 
heavily  against  one  of  her  controllers,,  who  supported  her 
by  placing  his  arm  about  her.  At  such  times  her  head 
would  be  in  contact  with  the  head  of  her  controller — the 
temples  touching.  Further,  on  numerous  occasions  her 
hands  were  tied  to  the  hands  of  her  controllers,  but  in 
spite  of  all  these  precautions,  of  their  constant  vigilance, 
in  spite  of  the  fact  that  the  observations  were  checked  oft' 


424  DEATH 

by  mechanical  apparatus  which  was  employed  for  the 
purpose,  phenomena  continued  to  happen — as  the  report 
fully  testifies. 

Throughout  these  sittings  the  light  was  usually  quite 
sufficient  to  enable  the  sitters  to  see  the  whole  of  the 
medium's  body  without  difficulty.  Her  hands  and  head 
were  nearly  always  perfectly  visible.  The  sitters  con- 
stantly dictated  to  the  stenographer  (who  sat  at  a 
separate  table  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  room)  just 
what  was  taking  place  and  the  manner  in  which  the 
hands,  feet,  and  knees  of  the  medium  were  being  held. 
The  utmost  rigour  was  observed  in  this  direction ;  and  it 
must  be  taken  into  account,  when  considering  this  case, 
that  all  three  of  the  investigators  were  fully  aware  of  all 
the  methods  of  trickery  employed  by  mediums  in  order 
to  release  their  hands,  feet,  &c.,  and  were  fully  prepared 
to  detect  it,  should  trickery  of  this  kind  exist.  It  must 
be  remembered  also,  that  it  was  sufficiently  light  to  enable 
the  sitters  to  see  the  medium  distinctly.  The  medium 
submitted  to  all  these  conditions  without  demur,  as  the 
following  extracts  will  show.  We  quote  a  few  sample 
passages  from  the  records  as  given  verlatim  to  the  steno- 
grapher at  the  time.  These  form,  therefore,  a  con- 
temporary record  of  everything  that  transpired  at  the 
sittings.^ 

During  the  second  sc^ance,  the  following  series  of 
remarkable  table  levitations  occurred,  which  were 
recorded  as  follows  : — 

10.54  P.M.  F.  :  I  have  changed  the  control  from  my  left  foot 
to  my  right;  my  right  foot  is  now  between  hers  and  the  leg  of 
the  table. 

10.58  P.M.  The  table  tilted  on  the  two  right  legs.  C  :  The 
medium's  left  hand  is  held  in  mine  over  the  table,  her  left  foot 

^  Throughout  the  sittings  F  —  Feilding,  B  —  Baggally,  and  C  —  Cairington. 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  425 

being  pressed  on  my  right,  and  my  right  knee  being  in  contact 
with  her  left  knee.  F.  :  Her  right  hand  was  on  my  shoulder. 
The  table  was  then  raised  entirely,  and  both  Carrington  and 
she  afterwards  pressed  on  Carrington's  side  of  the  table,  which 
went  up  in  spite  of  their  pressure.     C. :  I  pushed  strongly. 

11  P.M.  Total  levitation  of  the  table.  0.  :  The  medium's 
left  hand  pulled  up  my  right  about  4  inches  above  the  table,  the 
medium's  left  foot  pressing  against  my  right  foot,  my  right  knee 
pressing  against  her  left  knee.  F.  :  The  medium's  right  hand 
was  partly  in  mine,  the  wrist  just  touching  the  top  of  the  table, 
my  left  hand  across  both  her  knees,  my  right  foot  touching  her 
right  foot  between  it  and  the  table  leg,  my  face  being  within 
6  inches  of  the  edge  of  the  table. 

11.1  P.M.  The  table  tilts  on  the  two  legs  farthest  from 
medium,  both  her  hands  being  clearly  visible  and  about  a  foot 
away  from  the  table,  and  her  fists  being  clenched.  F.  :  On  a 
line  with  her  waist.  C.  :  The  control  of  the  feet  being  the 
same  as  before,  except  my  right  hand  is  now  also  grasping  her 
thigh.  F.  :  My  left  hand  across  both  her  knees.  (The  medium 
sat  well  back  in  her  chair,  and  her  body  was  at  least  9  inches 
from  the  table.  We  clearly  remember  the  conditions  of  this 
striking  phenomenon.     November  23.) 

11.5  P.M.  Complete  levitation  of  the  table.  F. :  The  table 
lifts  above  6  inches,  only  C.'s  and  my  hands  were  on  the  table, 
clasped  across  the  middle.  Complete  levitation  of  the  table. 
F.  :  Nobody's  hands  were  on  the  table  ;  it  goes  up  all  by  itself. 
Another  complete  levitation  of  the  table.  C. :  All  hands  being 
off  the  table,  her  right  hand  was  free  but  perfectly  visible,  and 
about  6  inches  off  the  table. 

11.9  P.M.  F.  :  Asks  medium  to  attempt  levitation  whilst 
standing  up ;  she  agrees,  but  presently  says  that  she  cannot 
stand  any  longer. 

11.11p.m.  Complete  levitation  of  the  table.  C.  :  Both  hands 
of  the  medium  were  about  8  inches  above  the  table.  I  can 
clearly  feel  her  left  foot  across  my  right ;  the  leg  of  the  table 
was  not  in  contact  with  her  skirt.  Second  complete  levitation 
of  the  table.  F. :  My  left  hand  was  underneath  the  bottom  of 
the  leg  of  the  table.     Her  right  hand  was  off  the  table  alto- 


426  DEATH 

gether.     C.  :  There  is  9  inches  between  her  body  and  the  table. 
Partial  levitation  of  the  table. 

11.13  P.M.  F. :  She  removed  her  hands  entirely  from  the  table 
about  2  feet,  and  the  table  went  up  on  the  two  legs  farthest 
from  her  about  1  foot.  Immediately  afterwards  she  repeated 
the  same,  taking  our  hands  in  her  lap ;  whereupon  the  table 
again  lifted  up  and  wriggled  about  without  anybody  touching  it. 
F. :  My  hand  was  on  her  left  hand  all  the  time.  0.  :  My  right 
hand  was  on  her  left  hand.  F. :  I  could  see  right  down  the  leg 
of  the  table. 

During  the  sixth  seance  the  following  series  of  pheno- 
mena took  place ;  they  were  perhaps  the  most  striking 
of  the  whole  series,  and  obtained  mider  excellent  condi- 
tions of  control.     The  record  stands  as  follows  : — 

C  :  She  now  leans  her  head  against  mine.  F.  :  She  did  not 
lean  back,  her  face  being  clearly  visible  and  motionless. 

11.41  P.M.  C. :  I  am  touched  by  a  hand  on  the  head.  F. :  I 
saw  a  white  thing  come  out  from  the  curtains  over  the  medium's 
head  towards  C.'s  head.  C. :  While  this  was  going  on  the 
medium's  head  was  resting  against  mine,  my  right  arm  being 
around  her  shoulder  ;  her  left  hand  being  visibly  on  mine  on  the 
table ;  her  left  foot  pressing  on  my  right.  B. :  Mine  exactly 
the  same  as  before ;  her  right  hand  was  resting  on  my  left  hand 
on  the  table,  under  the  curtain  ;  and  her  right  foot  is  resting  on 
my  left  foot,  and  her  right  knee  is  pressing  against  my  left 
knee.  (B. :  I  could  tell  it  was  her  right  hand  by  the  feeling  of 
the  relative  position  of  her  hand  to  her  fingers  and  feeling  the 
thumb  and  the  palm  of  her  hand,  and  that  it  was  her  real  hand 
by  the  warmth  and  by  the  responses  to  my  squeezes.  Decem- 
ber 5,  '08.) 

11.44  P.M.  Medium  says  it  is  coming  there  !  (Medium  said 
to  C. :  "  Look,  he  will  come  there!  "  indicating  a  particular  spot 
to  the  left  of  B.  December  5,  '08.)  C.  :  I  am  touched  on  the 
head  through  the  curtain  twice;  the  medium's  head  resting 
against  my  head,  the  left  hand  visibly  on  the  table  in  my  left 
hand  ;  her  left  knee  pressing  against  my  right  knee.     B.:    Her 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  427 

right  hand  is  resting  on  my  left  hand  on  the  table,  and  her  right 
foot  is  resting  on  my  left  foot,  and  I  still  continue  pressing  my 
knee  against  her  knee.     F. :  I  saw  something  white  just  over 
the  medium's  head ;  a  sort  of  a  flash  of  white.     The  medium's 
head  was  motionless.     C. :   I  am  hit  right  on  the  head  by  a 
hand  through  the  curtain.     (C. :  I  felt  the  four  fingers  and  the 
thumb  this  time  ;  the  hand  was  open,  and  a  minute  after  the 
fingers  were  closed  and  I  was  again  hit  on  the  head.     Decem- 
ber  5,   '08.)     Control   exactly   the   same ;    the   medium's  head 
against  mine,  and  she  kicked  with  her  foot  under  the  table  in 
front   of    her.     B. :  My   control    exactly  the    same    as    before. 
F. :  Note  that  I  can  see  the  position  of  all  the  three  heads  quite 
plainly.     B. :  A  hand  comes  out  from  behind  the  curtain  and 
presses  me  tightly  on  my  shoulder  ;  I  felt  the  thumb  and  the 
four  fingers,  which  are  now  pressing  downwards  with    a  very 
considerable   force.     0. :  I   was  holding  her  left  hand  by  the 
thumb  on  her  left  thigh,  her  left  foot  being  on  my  riijht,  her 
head  pressing  against  my  head.     B.  :  Her  right  hand  is  resting 
on  my  left  hand  ;  I  can  feel  both  her  knees  with  my  left  hand, 
which   I  have  passed  under  the  table ;    her  right  foot   is  on 
my  left  foot  and  our  knees  are  touching.      F. :  I  have  asked 
the  medium  whether  I  could  feel  the  hand  also  ;  she  replied  yes. 
F.  stands  to  the  left  of  C,  and  leans  over  with  his  left  hand 
outstretched  about  2|  feet  above  and  to  the  left  of  the  medium's 
head.     Immediately   after :    F.  :  I   am    touched   by   something 
straight  on  the  point  of  my  finger. 

12.11  P.M.  F.  :  I  am  touched  again  ;  I  am  taken  hold  of  by 
fingers,  and  I  can  feel  the  nails  quite  plainly.  (F.  :  My  fore- 
finger was  pressed  hard  by  three  separate  fingers  above  it  and 
by  a  thumb  below  through  the  curtain.  I  felt  the  nails  quite 
distinctly  as  they  pressed  into  my  finger.  December  6,  '08.) 
C.  :  Her  head  resting  against  my  head.  I  am  absolutely  holding 
her  left  hand  on  the  table ;  both  her  legs  are  around  my  right 
leg  under  the  chair.  B. :  I  am  absolutely  certain  that  her  right 
hand  is  on  my  left  hand  on  her  right  knee.  F.  :  I  am  touched 
again  ;  grasped  this  time  as  though  by  the  lower  part  of  a 
thumb  and  fingers.  B.  :  I  am  touched  gently  on  my  hand,  and 
at  the  same  moment  I  am  touched  by  a  hand  on  my  shoulder. 


428  DEATH 

B.  :  Also  the  curtain  came  out  as  though  struck  violently  by  a 
hand  from  within.  (The  touches  in  this  case  on  F.'s  hand, 
which  was  high  up,  and  on  B.'s  shoulder,  who  was  sitting  on  the 
other  side  of  the  table  with  the  curtain  over  the  table  and 
at  least  3  feet  from  F.'s  hand,  appeared  to  be  absolutely  simul- 
taneous ;  and  immediately  afterwards  the  curtain  was  thrust 
violently  out,  as  though  it  was  struck  hard  several  times  by 
a  hand  within.  December  6,  '08.)  B. :  Same  control.  C.  :  Same 
control.  (B. :  In  acknowledgment  of  this  outburst  of  pheno- 
mena I  said,  "  Thank  you,  John  "  ;  and  a  hand  replied  by  coming 
out  from  behind  the  curtain  and  patting  me  on  the  shoulder  in 
a  friendly  kind  of  way.  December  6,  '08.)  C.  :  She  squeezed 
my  left  hand  while  this  was  going  on. 

12.20  A.M.  C. :  The  medium  has  taken  her  two  legs  from 
around  my  right  leg,  and  now  has  her  left  foot  on  my  right 
foot.  B.  :  And  she  places  her  right  foot  on  my  left  foot,  and  I 
am  feeling  her  knee  with  my  knee.  C.  :  The  medium  rests 
her  head  on  my  right  shoulder,  and  is  pressing  against  mine ; 
I  have  my  arm  around  her  neck ;  I  have  her  left  hand  in  my 
left  hand  on  the  table.  I  saw  the  curtain  blow  out  in  front  of 
me.  B.  :  Medium's  right  hand  in  ray  left.  F.  :  I  saw  some- 
thing white  appear  on  the  farthest  side  of  the  cabinet  from  the 
medium,  up  by  the  door.  The  white  thing  I  saw  was  about  half 
way  up   the   curtain,   and   about    3  J   feet    from    the   medium. 

B.  :  My  control  the  same  as  before.  C.  :  I  am  touched  on  the 
head  by  a  hand.  At  this  moment  the  medium's  head  is  pressing 
against  my  head  ;  her  left  hand  in  my  left  on  the  table ;  and 
with  my  right  hand  I  am  holding  the  whole  of  her  left  arm. 
Her  left  foot  on  my  right  foot.  B.  :  Medium's  right  hand  rest- 
ing on  my  left  on  the  table ;  right  foot  on  my  left  foot,  which 
she  moves  backwards  and  forwards,  and  I  follow  with  my  foot. 
C. :  My  foot  was  motionless. 

12.23  P.M.     C.  :  I  am  touched  plainly  by  a  hand  on  the  head. 

C.  :  My  control  the  same  as  before.  F. :  I  saw  it  also.  It  was 
a  grey  thing. 

The  ninth  seance  was  one  of  the  most  remarkable  of 
the  whole  series.       Phenomena    began   almost   at  once, 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  429 

and  continued  in  spite  of  our  utmost  endeavours  to 
prevent  them.  The  following  extract  gives  a  good  idea 
of  the  extreme  rapidity  with  which  phenomena  followed 
one  another,  as  well  as  their  extraordinary  character.  At 
12.47  A.M.  we  have  the  following  record  : — 

12.47  A.M.  F.  :  I  ask  "Carlo"  to  give  me  the  tambourine 
(Medium  said  he  would  do  so,  and  I  moved  round  C.  F.  : 
14/12/08.)  B:  She  holds  my  right  hand  over  the  table  in 
front  of  her,  and  makes  gestures  with  it  in  the  air,  and  the 
tambourine  slid  along  the  ground.  C.  :  I  am  touched  again. 
C.  :  The  same  thing  has  happened  again.  C.  :  I  was  touched 
three  times  with  fingers  on  my  left  hand.  The  tambourine 
then  jumped  up  about  ten  to  twelve  times  inside  the  curtain, 
apparently  trying  to  get  to  the  edge  of  the  curtain,  and  was 
then  pushed  outside  the  curtain.  C.  :  I  am  grasped  very  firmly 
by  a  hand  through  the  curtain  on  the  left  lap.  I  felt  the 
medium's  right  hand  on  my  left  on  the  table  at  the  same 
moment  that  the  tambourine  was  kicking  about  the  inside  of 
the  cabinet.  B. :  I  am  holding  her  hand  on  the  table.  I  can 
see  it  quite  clearly. 

12.51  A.M.  Medium  wishes  to  touch  C,  which  she  does. 
C. :  I  was  grasped  just  above  the  left  elbow  by  four  fingers  and 
a  thumb,  which  pressed  very  hard  indeed.  C. :  I  am  touched 
on  the  left  side  by  a  hand.  I  am  holding  both  medium's  hands 
in  both  of  mine,  and  she  is  squeezing  tightly.  Her  right  foot 
pressing  strongly  on  my  left  foot  in  contact  with  my  right. 
B. :  I  was  holding  the  wrist  of  her  left  hand  with  my  right 
hand  on  the  table  in  full  view  of  us  all  and  perfectly  visible. 
My  right  knee  against  her  left  knee.  My  right  foot  under  her 
left  foot.  C.  :  I  am  holding  both  medium's  hands  in  both  of 
my  hands,  one  being  clearly  visible  and  one  on  the  table  under 
the  curtain.     Absolute  control  of  right  foot  and  leg. 

1.0  A.M.  C.  :  I  am  touched  on  the  face' by  a  hand  through 
the  curtain  as  the  medium  kicks  to  and  fro.  C.  :  I  am 
again  touched  on  the  face  by  a  hand,  medium  having  both 
her  legs  round  my  left  leg,  her  right  hand  holding  my  left  on 


430  DEATH 

the  table  in  the  middle  under  the  curtain.     B. :  Her  left  hand 
holding  my  right  hand  on  the  table,  which  I  see  clearly. 

These  extracts  will  at  least  serve  to  indicate  that 
fraud  was  apparently  impossible,  and  that,  to  all  appear- 
ances, the  phenomena  were  real.  Yet,  if  real,  what  a 
complex  problem  is  before  us !  And,  short  of  some 
spiritistic  theory — how  adequately  account  for  the 
facts  ? 

5.  EusAPiA  Palladino's  American  Stances. 

Eusapia  Palladino  visited  America  in  1909-10,  under 
the  management  of  Mr.  Carrington,  and  gave  a  large 
number  of  se'ances,  which  were  attended  by  scientific 
men  and  members  of  the  S.P.R.  While  fraud  was 
detected  on  several  occasions,  the  seances  were  on  the 
whole  good,  and  afforded  strong  confirmatory  evidence 
of  the  supernormal  character  of  these  manifestations. 

It  would  be  impossible  in  this  place  to  give  any 
detailed  account  of  these  sittings — (the  report  of  which 
was  published  in  the  Annals  of  Fsychical  Science,  1910-11) 
— but  the  following  summary,  written  by  Mr.  Carrington, 
will  give  a  fair  idea  of  the  evidence,  as  it  appeared  to 
him,  after  witnessing  more  than  thirty  seances : — 

"  Every  one  who  has  studied  Eusapia's  phenomena  knows 
that  practically  every  stance  (for  some  reason)  commences  with 
table  levitations — this,  whether  they  are  wanted  or  not !  It 
seems  the  necessary  programme,  and  it  is  almost  invariably 
carried  out.  Seeing  them  time  after  time,  one  can  obtain  a 
very  fair  idea  of  their  nature  and  reality.  And  I  may  say 
that  I  now  consider  these  levitations  as  well  established  as 
any  other  physical  facts.  They  are  not  open  to  the  objection 
to  which  most  psychical  phenomena  are  subjected — that  they 
cannot  be  repeated  or  induced  and  studied  experimentally,  as 
one  would  study  other  physical  facts — for  they  can  be  induced 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  431 

and  studied  in  just  this  laboratory  manner.  I  have  probably 
seen  several  hundred  of  these  levitations,  now,  under  every 
conceivable  condition  and  in  excellent  light,  and  I  consider 
them  so  far  established  that,  as  Count  Solovovo  said,  the 
burden  of  proof  is  now  on  the  man  who  asserts  that  they 
are  not  real ;  not  upon  the  man  who  asserts  that  they  are. 
I  have  seen  levitations  take  place  time  after  time  in  a 
brilliantly-lighted  room,  when  Eusapia's  feet  were  clearly 
seen,  when  her  knees  were  held,  and  no  part  of  her  clothing 
was  in  contact  with  the  table,  when  her  feet  had  been  tied  with 
rope  to  the  feet  of  her  chair,  when  both  Eusapia's  feet  were  held 
under  the  table  by  a  third  controller,  when  the  '  stocks '  ap- 
paratus was  in  use,  when  the  controllers  on  either  side  of  her 
passed  their  hands  to  and  fro  repeatedly  between  the  medium's 
legs  and  body  and  the  table,  when  her  hands  were  off  the 
table  altogether,  when  the  medium  was  standing  up.  These 
levitations,  too,  were  not  all  of  them  of  the  sudden,  almost 
instantaneous  character  seen  by  us  in  Naples.  We  have  had 
levitations  lasting  twenty  and  twenty-five  and  thirty  seconds, 
and  even  longer,  as  timed  by  the  watch  on  the  stenographer's 
table.  These  levitations,  too,  some  of  them,  have  been  two  feet 
or  more  from  the  floor.  On  two  occasions  the  table  rose  to  a 
height  of  about  two  feet,  remained  vip  for  several  seconds, 
fell  almost  to  the  floor — without  touching  it,  however — and 
then  rose  again  to  its  former  height.  On  at  least  one 
occasion  the  table  rose  so  high  that  Eusapia  had  to  stand, 
with  her  hands  raised  above  her  head,  in  order  to  keep  them 
on  the  top  of  the  table.  In  this  position  Eusapia  walked 
five  or  six  feet  away  from  the  cabinet,  the  table  still  sus- 
pended in  the  air,  before  it  fell  with  a  crash  to  the  floor. 
During  nearly  all  these  levitations  the  controllers  had  ample 
time,  as  a  rule,  to  pass  their  hands  between  the  table  and 
the  medium's  body,  in  order  to  prove  that  no  hook  or  similar 
attachment  was  possible,  as  Mr.  W.  S.  Davis  suggested,  and, 
in  fact,  publicly  stated  was  the  case ! 

"  The  '  curtain  phenomena,'  seen  in  America,  were  of  the 
usual  variety  seen  before,  and  presented  nothing  of  particular 
interest.     It  is  curious  to  note  that,  throughout  a  long  course  of 


432  DEATH 

sittings,  the  bulging  of  Eusapia's  dress  was  noticed  only  on  one 
occasion.  The  breeze  from  Eusapia's  forehead  was  noted,  in  .all, 
five  or  six  times,  and  I  have  learned  one  rather  interesting 
thing  in  this  connection.  It  is  this.  After  a  good  seance 
this  breeze  is  strong,  and  after  a  poor  stance  it  is  altogether 
lacking — or  so  feeble  that  it  can  hardly  be  detected.  On 
three  occasions  Eusapia  gave  a  sort  of  '  after-sitting '  to  three 
or  four  of  us  who  had  remained  (after  the  other  sitters  had 
departed),  and  the  most  startling  phenomena  I  have  ever  seen 
occurred  at  these  '  informal '  stances.  A  strong  breeze  was 
always  found  to  issue  from  E.  P.'s  scar  after  these  sittings, 
though  none  had  been  noticed  after  the  regular  or  '  formal ' 
seance  given  earlier  the  same  evening. 

"  Of  transportation  of  objects  without  apparent  cause  we  have 
had  many  examples,  and  under  excellent  conditions.  The  small 
table  from  the  cabinet  has  repeatedly  been  placed  on  the  seance 
table,  when  both  Eusapia's  feet  were  well  controlled  ;  and  in 
several  instances,  when  her  feet  had  been  tied  with  rope  to 
the  feet  of  her  controllers,  or  to  the  rungs  of  her  chair.  On 
one  occasion,  the  small  table  was  slowly  lifted  out  of  the 
cabinet,  beyond  and  round  the  left-hand  curtain,  in  a  light 
sufficiently  good  to  see  that  the  medium  was  not  touching  it. 
The  table  rose  to  a  height  of  nearly  four  feet  from  the  floor, 
rapped  five  times  against  the  wooden  partition,  forming  the 
*  wall '  on  that  side  of  the  room,  turned  upside  down,  and 
fell  to  the  floor.  It  was  between  three  and  four  feet  from 
Eusapia  at  the  time,  and,  as  I  have  said,  it  was  light  enough 
to  see  that  nothing  was  touching  it.  While  this  was  in  progress, 
both  her  hands  were  separately  accounted  for,  and  I  was 
holding  both  her  feet  under  the  table  in  my  hands. 

"  At  nearly  everyone  of  our  stances  we  have  had  one  or  more 
of  the  musical  instruments  pla3'ed  upon.  The  music-box  has 
been  played  upon  for  several  seconds  together — the  handle 
being  turned  twelve  or  fourteen  times,  to  judge  by  the  sound. 
Ample  time  was  afforded  for  the  controllers  to  ascertain  that 
they  were  holding  separate  hands.  The  tambourine  has  been 
played  upon  for  almost  a  minute — it  being  seen  to  play  over  the 
medium's  head,  then  beyond  the  left-hand  curtain ;  again  over 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  433 

the  medium's  head,  over  the  head  of  the  left-hand  controller, 
again  over  the  medium's  head,  again  beyond  the  left  curtain, 
and  finally  it  was  thrown  to  the  floor  in  the  cabinet.  The  small 
bell  has  repeatedly  been  rung  for  several  seconds  together — a 
hand  being  seen  ringing  it. 

"  One  of  the  most  remarkable  manifestations,  however,  was  the 
playing  of  the  mandolin,  on  at  least  two  occasions.  The  instru- 
ment sounded  in  the  cabinet  first  of  all — distinct  twangings  of 
the  strings  being  heard,  in  response  to  pickings  of  Eusapia's 
fingers  on  the  hand  of  one  of  her  controllers.  The  mandolin 
then  floated  out  of  the  cabinet,  on  to  the  stance  table,  inhere,  in 
full  view  of  all,  nothing  touching  it,  it  continued  to  play  for  nearly 
a  minute — first  one  string  and  then  another  being  played  upon. 
Eusapia  was  at  the  time  in  deep  trance,  and  was  found  to  be 
cataleptic  a  few  moments  later.  Her  hands  were  gripping  the 
hands  of  her  controllers  so  tightly  that  each  finger  had  to  be 
opened  in  turn — by  the  aid  of  passes  and  suggestion. 

"  At  the  second  stance  an  incident  occurred  which  cannot  be 
explained  by  any  normal  means — even  granting,  for  the  sake 
of  argument,  that  Eusapia  had  succeeded  in  releasing  one 
hand ;  and  as  such  incidents  are  rather  rare,  it  should  be 
recorded.  One  of  the  sitters  was  standing  behind  the  right- 
hand  controller,  and  about  five  feet  from  Eusapia.  The  medium 
seemed  to  be  well  controlled.  Suddenly,  immediately  in  front 
of  this  sitter,  about  on  a  level  with  his  eyes,  appeared  in  space 
the  small  flageolet,  which  had  been  placed  on  the  table  in  the 
cabinet.  ^'No  one  saw  how  it  got  into  its  present  position ;  but 
there  it  was,  suspended  in  space,  about  five  feet  from  Eusapia, 
and  certainly  too  far  for  her  to  have  reached  with  her  right 
hand,  even  had  it  been  free,  and  had  she  been  standing  up.. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  however,  her  right  hand  was  not  free,  and 
every  one  could  see  her  seated  in  her  usual  place  at  the  table. 
--Here,  then,  we  have  an  example  of  a  phenomenon  that  could 
not  have  been  produced  by  the  medium's  hand  (even  supposing 
it  to  be  free),  because  the  flageolet  was  seen  to  be  far  beyond 
her  reach.  It  remained  in  this  attitude  long  enough  for  Mr.  B. 
to  reach  out  his  hand  and  take  the  flageolet — after  his  atten- 
tion had  been  drawn  to  it.     Certainly  it  remained  suspended 

2  E 


434  DEATH 

in  space  for  several  seconds,  without  visible  means  of  sup- 
port. 

"  The  hands  and  faces  seen  during  our  seances  here  were  of 
the  same  general  character  as  those  seen  at  Naples.  Some 
would  appear  to  be  fleecy,  gaseous,  evanescent ;  some,  on  the 
contrary,  would  seem  to  be  perfectly  solid  and  human,  and, 
were  it  not  for  the  fact  that  Eusapia's  hands  were  held  securely, 
and  frequently  seen  lying  upon  the  table  at  the  time,  one 
would  swear  that  they  were  her  own  hands  and  arms  perform- 
ing the  'touchings.'  As  it  was,  she  appeared  to  develop  a 
'  third  arm,'  which  issued  from  her  shoulder,  and  seemed  to 
recede  into  it.  There  were  one  or  two  rather  remarkable 
demonstrations  of  this.  As  before,  '  touchings  '  were  frequently 
experienced  when  nothing  could  be  seen  touching  the  sitter. 
On  such  occasions  there  was  a  clearly-lighted  space  between 
Eusapia  and  the  sitter  who  received  the  touches.  On  the 
other  hand,  Eusapia's  '  materialised  '  hands  frequently  remained 
visible  for  several  seconds  together ;  and  in  one  case  a  hand 
rested  on  the  right  controller's  back  while  she  counted  eleven. 

"  On  one  or  two  occasions,  faces  were  seen  by  some  of  the 
sitters  (I  personally  never  saw  one),  and  at  another  time  an 
entire  form  was  seen  standing  behind  one  of  the  sitters.  On  this 
occasion,  the  controller  on  the  right  had  received  a  touch  on 
his  shoulder,  and  looking  round  saw  a  distinct  form  standing 
behind  him.  As  he  looked,  the  form  slowly  disintegrated  and 
vanished — disappearing  like  a  wisp  of  smoke  into  the  cabinet. 
This  process  of  '  dematerialisation '  took  several  seconds. 

"  We  have  secured  at  least  one  print  of  '  spirit  fingers '  in 
clay,  placed  in  the  cabinet.  It  must  be  acknowledged  that  the 
conditions  pertaining  to  this  experiment  were  not  evidentially 
perfect.  It  would  be  hard  to  say  wluj  not,  as  the  controllers 
seemed  satisfied  throughout  that  they  had  constant  control  of 
the  medium's  hands.  Nevertheless,  the  impression  did  not 
induce  in  me  a  feeling  of  complete  confidence.  At  the  same 
time  it  must  be  acknowledged  that  we  found  it  impossible, 
when  experimenting  after  the  stance,  to  imitate  the  marks  we 
found  on  the  clay.  For,  whereas  the  '  spirit  fingers '  were  smooth, 
any  impression  made  by  our  own  fingers  was  rough — the  fingers 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  435 

pulling  away  some  of  the  clay.  The  texture  of  the  touch,  so  to 
say,  was  different.  A  photograph  of  this  clay  is  given  in  my 
report  on  the  American  seances. 

"  We  also  obtained  an  imprint  on  a  photographic  plate,  which 
had  been  wrapped  in  several  thicknesses  of  black  paper,  and 
placed  in  the  cabinet.  It  will  be  remembered  that  Professor 
Lombroso  gave  an  example  of  this  in  his  book  After  Death — 
^V^lat  ?  p.  84  (Fig.  35).  The  phenomenon  is  of  such  rare  occur- 
rence that  this  new  confirmation  of  the  fact  cannot  fail  to  be  of 
interest.  The  plate  was  provided  by  Dr.  Frederick  T.  Simpson, 
of  Hartford,  Conn.,  who  placed  it  in  the  cabinet.  It  was 
brought  to  New  York  wrapped,  and  taken  out  of  Dr.  Simpson's 
bag  just  before  the  seance.  When  developed,  the  impression 
of  three  fingers  was  found  on  the  plate.  (An  illustration  of 
this  is  also  given  in  my  report.)  There  is  no  normal  ex- 
planation of  this  fact,  as  every  precaution  was  taken.  The 
photographer  who  wrapped  the  plate  took  an  impression  of  his 
own  fingers  later,  and  they  are  about  three  times  the  size  of 
those  upon  the  plate.  Whatever  their  interpretation,  they 
cannot  be  explained  by  normal  means. 

"  Readers  of  our  Naples  Report  will  remember  that^  on  one 
occasion,  the  rope  fastening  Eusapia's  left  leg  was  untied. 
Mr.  Feilding's  amusing  comments  on  this  incident  will  also  be 
remembered.  In  one  of  our  stances  a  white  hand  appeared, 
remained  visible  to  all,  and  untied  both  Eusapia's  hands  and 
one  of  her  feet.  [They  had  all  been  fastened  with  rope.] 
First  of  all,  the  left  wrist  was  untied.  Eusapia  said  that  '  it 
was  not  her  fault,'  and  asked  to  be  tied  up  again.  This  was 
done,  even  more  securely  than  before.  A  white  hand  then 
appeared,  and  untied  the  knots  on  both  Eusapia's  wrists  and 
her  left  ankle,  coiled  up  the  rope  and  threw  it  at  one  of  the 
spectators.  The  whole  operation  took  more  than  a  minute, 
during  which  time,  it  need  hardly  be  said,  the  controllers  had 
ample  time  to  verify  their  control,  in  response  to  my  urgent 
and  repeated  entreaties  to  do  so !  The  controllers  on  this 
occasion  were  well-known  business  men,  extremely  sceptical  in 
the  ordinary  walks  of  life.  They  had  to  admit,  however,  that 
there  was  no  doubt  as  to  the  reality  of  this  phenomenon. 


436  DEATH 

"  Intelligent  action  has  been  shown  on  several  occasions. 
Once,  a  gentleman  seated  to  the  left  of  Ensapia  had  his  cigar- 
case  extracted  from  his  pocket,  placed  on  the  table  in  full  vie-w 
of  all  of  us,  opened,  a  cigar  extracted,  and  placed  between  his 
teeth.  It  was  light  enough  at  the  time  to  see  that  no  one  was 
touching  the  case,  which  was  lying  on  the  table. 

"  Incidents  of  this  kind  could  be  multiplied  indefinitely.  The 
shorthand  reports  of  some  of  these  stances  read  like  fairy  tales. 
0]i  the  other  hand,  of  course,  we  had  our  bad  seances.  Some 
points  of  great  theoretical  interest  have  come  up  during  this 
American  series  of  sittings. 

"  To  sum  up  the  effects  of  these  stances  upon  my  own  mind,  I 
may  say  that,  after  seeing  nearly  forty  seances,  there  remains 
not  the  shadow  of  a  doubt  in  my  mind  as  to  the  reality  of 
the  vast  majority  of  the  phenomena  occurring  in  Eusapia 
Palladino's  presence.  And  I  refer  not  only  to  the  table  levita- 
tions,  raps,  and  curtain  phenomena,  but  to  movements  of 
objects  without  contact,  playing  upon  musical  instruments 
without  apparent  cause,  and  the  '  materialisation '  of  hands 
and  arms,  which  perform  intelligent  and  complicated  actions. 
It  appears  incredible  to  me  that,  inasmuch  as  I  have  had  no 
difficulty,  in  the  past,  in  seeing  the  modus  operandi  of  fraudulent 
spiritualistic  phenomena  in  one,  or  at  most,  two  seances,  that, 
after  seeing  thirty-six  stances,  I  should  be  unable  to  detect  the 
trick — if  trick  there  were ;  and,  further,  that  the  oftener  I  saw 
the  phenomena,  the  more  convinced  I  became  that  no  trick  had 
been  employed,  and  that  the  phenomena  were  genuine !  I  can 
but  record  the  fact  that  further  study  of  this  medium  has  con- 
vinced me  more  than  ever  that  our  Naples  experiments  and 
deductions  were  correct,  that  we  were  not  deceived,  but  that 
we  did,  in  very  truth,  see  prseternormal  manifestations  of  a 
remarkable  character.  I  am  as  assured  of  the  reality  of  Eusapia 
Palladino's  phenomena  as  I  am  of  any  other  fact  in  life  • 
and  they  are,  to  my  mind,  just  as  well  established."  (See 
Appendix  C.) 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  437 


Part  II. — The  Mental  Phenomena. 

We  have  just  presented  a  mass  of  material,  selected 
from  a  much  larger  quantity,  tending  to  show  that  the 
spirit  of  man  is  capable  of  producing  certain  material 
changes  in  the  physical  world.  Although  many  of  the 
phenomena  seem  to  suggest  some  spiritistic  interpre- 
tation, it  may  be  said  that  the  physical  phenomena  do 
not  prove  it ;  and  more  conclusive  evidence  will  have  to 
be  forthcoming  before  we  can  definitely  accept  spiritism 
as  a  working  hypothesis.  We  accordingly  turn  to  the 
mental  phenomena,  to  see  whether  any  such  evidence  is 
forthcoming.  We  think  that  we  are  safe  in  asserting  that 
the  evidence  now  becomes  very  striking — even  forcing 
some  sort  of  acceptance  of  the  facts,  and  necessitating 
an  explanation  of  the  observed  phenomena.  We  propose 
in  this  section,  therefore,  to  lay  before  the  reader  a 
summary  of  the  most  striking  evidence  so  far  obtained 
of  the  operation  of  an  independent  intelligence, — other 
than  that  of  the  medium, — possessing  a  mind,  will,  and 
memory  of  its  own — in  fact,  all  the  attributes  of  a 
personality.  Only  by  such  evidence  can  the  persistence 
of  consciousness  be  proved.  To  this  evidence  we  accord- 
ingly turn. 

1.  The  Subliminal  Consciousness. 

Whether  or  not  the  powers  of  the  mind  afford  any 
evidence  for  the  survival  of  the  soul  is  a  question  that 
is  much  in  dispute.  Some  authors.  Professors  Jastrow 
and  Mlinsterberg,  e.g.,  claim  that  such  faculties  as  we 
have  good  evidence  for  do  not  warrant  any  such  conclu- 
sion;  others — notably  Myers — assert  that  they  do — at 
least,  if  the  reality  of  certain  facts  be  admitted,  for  which 


438  DEATH 

there  is  good  evidence.  In  the  marvellous  powers  of  the 
subconscious  mind — the  "  subjective  mind  "  of  Hudson, 
the  "  subliminal  consciousness "  of  Myers — evidence  is 
seemingly  afforded  that  the  human  mind  is  not  destined 
to  assert  its  sway  upon  this  earth  alone.  It  is  certain 
that,  if  powers  are  possessed  by  man  for  which  there 
is  no  use,  such  powers  would  long  ago  have  passed  out 
of  existence — the  result  of  the  selective  process  of  evolu- 
tion. If  man's  mind,  then,  seems  to  possess  faculties 
which  are  useless  in  this  world,  but  which  might  possibly 
be  of  some  use  in  some  other,  supersensible  world,  then 
surely,  here  is  good  evidence  that  the  mind  of  man  is  not 
merely  the  result  of  terrene  evolution,  but  is  destined  for 
higher  things.  The  flashes  of  genius,  the  extraordinary 
powers  manifested  under  hypnotic  suggestion,  especially 
the  supernormal  faculties  of  telepathy,  clairvoyance,  &c., 
are  of  practically  no  use  in  this  life  of  ours,  but  are 
supposed  to  be  the  normal  methods  of  communication 
in  the  next  life.  The  extensive  and  accurate  memory 
possessed  by  the  mind — the  "  latent  memory  "  that  Sir 
William  Hamilton  so  strongly  insisted  upon — is  another 
indication  that  the  mind  is  destined  to  utilise  these 
thoughts  and  memories  at  some  time  in  the  future — 
for  otherwise  why  are  they  so  carefully  preserved  ?  Mr.  Myers 
is,  of  course,  the  great  apostle  of  this  doctrine,  having 
made  it  the  central  theme  of  his  magnificent  book, 
Euman  Personality.  His  conception  is,  perhaps,  most 
clearly  stated  in  the  Proceedings  of  the  Society  for  Psychical 
Research,  vol.  vii.,  p.  301.     There  he  said: — 

"  I  suggest,  then,  that  the  stream  of  consciousness  in  which 
we  habitually  live  is  not  the  only  consciousness  that  is  in  connec- 
tion with  our  organism.  Our  habitual  or  empirical  consciousness 
may  consist  of  a  mere  fraction  from  a  multitude  of  thoughts  and 
sensations,  of  which  some  at  least  are  equally  conscious  with 
those  that  we  empirically  know.      I  accord  no  primacy  to  my 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  439 

ordinary  waking  self,  except  that  among  my  potential  selves  this 
one  has  shown  itself  the  fittest  to  meet  the  needs  of  common  life. 
I  hold  that  it  has  established  no  further  claim  ;  and  that  it  is 
perfectly  possible  that  other  thoughts,  feelings,  and  memories, 
either  isolated  or  in  continuous  connection,  may  now  be  actively 
conscious,  as  we  say, '  within  me  ' — in  some  kind  of  co-ordination 
with  my  organism,  and  forming  some  part  of  my  total  indivi- 
duality. I  conceive  it  possible  that  at  some  future  time,  and 
under  changed  conditions,  I  may  recollect  all ;  I  may  assume 
these  various  personalities  under  one  single  consciousness,  in 
which  ultimate  and  complete  consciousness  the  empirical  con- 
sciousness which  at  this  moment  diverts  my  hand  may  be  only 
one  element  out  of  many." 

As  is  well  known,  Myers  thought  that  the  powers  of 
the  subliminal  consciousness  were,  in  a  way,  good  evidence 
for  "  survival " ;  however,  as  the  point  is  so  much  in  dis- 
pute, we  will  not  press  it  unduly. 


2.  Clairvoyance. 

The  phenomena  classed  under  the  general  head  of 
clairvoyance  are  of  peculiar  interest,  for  our  present  pur- 
poses, in  showing  (apparently)  the  possibility  of  separation 
of  soul  and  body.  In  many  cases  of  induced  mesmerism, 
what  is  called  "  travelling  clairvoyance "  results ;  that 
is,  a  state  in  which  the  mind  of  the  mesmerised  sub- 
ject seems  to  be  transported,  or  sent  away  on  long 
journeys,  at  the  end  of  which  it  is  enabled  to  see  certain 
events  that  are  taking  place  and  scenes  that  the  subject 
has  never  beheld  in  the  body.  The  following  account  by 
Professor  De  Morgan  is  a  good  example  of  this,  which  we 
quote  somewhat  in  full : — 

"  I  have  seen  a  good  deal  of  mesmerism,  and  have  tried  it 

myself  on for  the  removal  of  ailments.     But  this  is  not  the 

point.    I  had  frequently  heard  of  the  thing  they  called  clairvoy- 


440  DEATH 

ance,  and  had  been  assured  of  the  occurrence  of  it  in  my  own 
house,  but  always  considered  it  as  a  thing  of  which  I  had  no 
evidence,  direct  or  personal,  and  which  I  could  not  admit  until 
such  evidence  came. 

**  One  evening  1  dined  at  a  house  about  a  mile  from  my  own — 
a  house  in  which  my  wife  had  never  been  at  that  time.  I  left  it 
at  half -past  ten,  and  was  in  my  own  house  at  a  quarter  to  eleven. 
At  my  entrance  my  wife  said  to  me,  '  We  have  been  after  you,' 
and  told  me  that  a  little  girl  whom  she  mesmerised  for  epileptic 
fits  (and  who  left  her  cured),  and  of  whose  clairvoyance  she  had 
told  me  other  instances,  had  been  desired  in  the  mesmeric  state 

to  follow  me  to  Street,  to 's  house.     The  thing  took 

place  at  a  few  minutes  after  ten.  On  hearing  the  name  of  the 
street,  the  girl's  mother  said  : 

"  '  She  will  never  find  her  way  there.  She  has  never  been  so 
far  away  from  Camden  Town.' 

"  The  girl  in  a  moment  got  there.  '  Knock  at  the  door,'  said 
my  wife.  '  I  cannot,'  said  the  girl ;  '  we  must  go  in  at  the  gate.' 
(The  house,  a  most  unusual  thing  in  London,  stands  in  a  garden; 
this  my  wife  knew  nothing  of.)  When  she  had  been  made  to  go 
in  and  knock  at  the  door,  or  simulate,  or  whatever  the  people 
do,  the  girl  said  she  heard  voices  upstairs,  and  being  told  to  go 
up,  exclaimed,  'What  a  comical  house  !  there  are  three  doors,'  de- 
scribing them  thus  (diagram  given).  (This  was  true,  and  is  not 
usual  in  any  but  large  houses.)  On  being  told  to  go  into  the 
room  from  whence  the  voices  came,  she  said,  '  Now  I  see  Mr.  De 
Morgan,  but  he  has  a  nice  coat  on,  and  not  the  long  coat  he  wears 
here  ;  and  he  is  talking  to  an  old  gentleman,  and  there  are  ladies.' 
This  was  a  true  description  of  the  party,  except  that  the  other 
gentleman  was  not  old.  'And  now,'  she  said,  'there  is  a  lady 
come  to  them,  and  she  is  beginning  to  talk  to  Mr.  De  INIorgan 
and  the  old  gentleman,  and  Mr.  De  Morgan  is  pointing  at  you 
and  the  old  gentleman  is  looking  at  me.'  About  the  time  indi- 
cated I  happened  to  be  talking  to  my  host  about  mesmerism,  and 
having  mentioned  what  my  wife  was  doing,  or  said  she  was  doing 
with  the  little  girl,  he  said,  '  Oh,  my  wife  must  hear  this,'  and 
called  her,  and  she  came  up  and  joined  us  in  the  manner  de- 
scribed.    The  girl  then  proceeded  to  describe  the  room :  stated 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  441 

that  there  were  two  pianos  in  it.  There  was  one  (piano),  and 
an  ornamental  sideboard,  not  much  unlike  a  pianoforte  to  the 
daughter  of  a  poor  charwoman.  There  were  two  kinds  of  cur- 
tains, red  and  white,  and  curiously  looped  up  (all  true  to  the 
letter),  and  that  there  were  wine  and  water  and  biscuits  on  the 
table.  Now  my  wife,  knowing  that  we  had  dined  at  half-past  six, 
and  thinking  it  impossible  that  anything  but  coffee  could  be  on 
the  table,  said,  'You  mean  coffee.'  The  girl  persisted,  'Wine, 
water,  and  biscuits.'  My  wife,  still  persuaded  that  it  must  be 
coffee,  tried  in  every  way  to  lead  her  witness  and  make  her  say 
coffee.  But  still  the  girl  persisted,  '  Wine,  water,  and  biscuits,' 
which  was  literally  true,  it  not  being  what  people  talk  of  under 
the  name  of  a  glass  of  wine  and  a  biscuit,  which  means  sand- 
wiches, cake,  &c.,  but  strictly  wine,  water,  and  biscuits. 

"  Now  all  this  taking  place  at  twenty  minutes  after  ten,  was 
told  to  me  at  a  quarter  to  eleven.  When  I  heard  that  I  was  to 
have  an  account  given,  I  said,  '  Tell  me  all  of  it,  and  I  will  not 
say  a  word ' ;  and  I  assure  you  that  during  the  narration  I  took 
the  most  special  care  not  to  utter  one  syllahle.  For  instance, 
when  the  wine,  water,  and  biscuits  came  up,  my  wife,  perfectly 
satisfied  that  it  must  have  been  coffee,  told  me  how  the  girl 
persisted,  and  enlarged  upon  it  as  a  failure,  giving  parallel 
instances  of  cases  in  which  clairvoyants  had  been  right  in  all 
things  but  one.  Now  all  this  I  heard  without  interruption. 
Now  that  the  things  happened  to  me  as  I  have  described  at 
twenty  minutes  after  ten,  and  were  described  to  me  at  a  quarter 
to  eleven,  I  could  make  oath.  The  curtains  I  ascertained  the 
next  day,  for  I  had  not  noticed  them.  When  my  wife  came  to 
see  the  room  she  instantly  recognised  a  door,  which  she  had 
forgotten  in  her  narrative. 

"  All  this  is  no  secret.  You  may  tell  whom  you  like  and  give 
my  name.  What  do  you  make  of  it  ?  Will  the  never-failing 
doctrine  of  coincidence  explain  it  ?  " 

We  next  give  a  case  of  spontaneous  clairvoj^ance,  in 
which  a  distant  scene  was  apparently  visited  in  a  dream. 
The  experience  is  recorded  by  Mrs.  Alfred  Wedgwood 
the  daughter-in-law  of  Mr.  Hensleigh  Wedgwood,  who 


442  DEATH 

was  an  English  savant  of  some  reputation  and  the 
brother-in-law  of  Charles  Darwin.  The  narrative  is 
given  in  her  own  language : — 

"  I  spent  the  Christmas  holidays  with  my  father-in-law  in 
Queen  Anne  Street,  and  in  the  beginning  of  January  I  had 
a  remarkably  vivid  dream,  which  I  told  to  him  the  next  day  at 
breakfast. 

"  1  dreamt  I  went  to  a  strange  house  standing  at  the  corner 
of  a  street.  When  I  reached  the  top  of  the  stairs  I  noticed  a 
window  opposite  with  a  little  coloured  glass,  short  muslin  blinds 
running  on  a  brass  rod.  The  top  of  the  ceiling  had  a  window 
veiled  by  gathered  muslin.  There  were  two  small  shrubs  on  a 
little  table.  The  drawing-room  had  a  bow-window,  with  the 
same  blinds ;  the  library  had  a  polished  floor,  with  the  same 
blinds. 

"  As  I  was  going  to  a  child's  party  at  a  cousin's  whose  house 
I  had  never  seen,  I  told  my  father-in-law  that  I  thought  that 
that  would  prove  to  be  the  house. 

"On  January  10, 1  went  with  my  little  boy  to  the  party,  and, 
by  mistake,  gave  the  driver  a  wrong  number.  When  he  stopped 
at  No.  20,  I  had  misgivings  about  the  house,  and  remarked  to 
the  cabman  that  it  was  not  a  corner  house.  The  servant  could 
not  tell  me  where  Mrs.  H.  lived,  and  had  not  a  blue-book. 
Then  I  thought  of  my  dream,  and  as  a  last  resource  I  walked 
down  the  street  looking  up  for  the  peculiar  blinds  I  had  observed 
in  my  dream.  These  I  met  with  at  No.  50,  a  corner  house,  and, 
knocking  at  the  door,  was  relieved  to  find  that  it  was  the  house 
of  which  I  was  in  search. 

"  On  going  upstairs,  the  room  and  windows  corresponded 
exactly  with  what  I  had  seen  in  my  dream,  and  the  same  little 
shrubs  in  their  pots  were  standing  on  the  landing.  The  window 
in  which  I  had  seen  the  coloured  glass  was  hidden  by  the  blind 
being  drawn  down,  but  I  learnt,  upon  inquiry,  that  it  was 
really  there." 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  443 

3.  Phantasms  of  the  Dead. 

As  we  have  previously  pointed  out,  apparitions  that 
do  not  coincide  either  with  any  death  or  illness  of  the 
agent  will  have  to  contend  with  the  objection  that  they 
are  mere  empty  hallucinations ;  and  we  have  to  depend 
upon  the  content  of  the  apparition,  as  it  were,  in  order 
to  establish  the  fact  that  they  are  anything  more  than 
the  ordinar}^  hallucinations  with  which  we  are  familiar. 
When  an  apparition  furnishes  information  previously 
unknown  to  the  percipient,  however,  there  is  very  fair 
evidence  for  the  fact  that  an  independent  intelligence  is 
operative ;  and  if  this  bears  upon  the  personal  identity 
of  the  person  deceased,  there  is  evidence  of  a  sort  that 
he  is  there  in  reality — initiating,  or  in  some  way  regulat- 
ing, the  observed  phenomena.  Mr.  Myers,  in  his  paper, 
"  On  Recognised  Apparitions  Occurring  more  than  a  Year 
after  Death"  [Proceedings  S.P.B.,  vol.  vi.,  pp.  13-65),  enu- 
merated a  number  of  cases  of  this  character,  and  we 
quote  one  by  way  of  illustration : — 

"  When  my  old  friend,  John  F.  Harford,  who  had  been  a 
Wesleyan  lay  preacher  for  half  a  century,  lay  dying,  in  June  of 
1851,  he  sent  for  me,  and  when  I  went  to  his  bedside  he  said, 
'  I  am  glad  you  have  come,  friend  Happerfield  ;  I  cannot  die 
easy  until  I  am  assured  that  my  wife  will  be  looked  after  and 
cared  for  until  she  may  be  called  to  join  me  in  the  other  world. 
I  have  known  you  for  many  years,  and  now  want  you  to  pro- 
mise me  to  look  to  her  well-being  during  the  little  time  she  may 
remain  after  me.'  I  said,  '  I  will  do  what  I  can,  so  let  your 
mind  be  at  rest.'  He  said,  '  I  can  trust  you,'  and  he  soon  after, 
on  the  20th  day  of  the  month,  fell  asleep  in  the  Lord.  I 
administered  his  affairs,  and  when  all  was  settled  there  remained 
a  balance  in  favour  of  the  widow,  but  not  sufficient  to  keep  her. 
I  put  her  into  a  small  cottage,  interested  some  friends  in  her 
case,  and  I  saw  that  she  was  comfortable.     After  a  while  Mrs. 


444  DEATH 

Harford's  grandson  came,  and  proposed  to  take  the  old  lady 
to  his  house  in  Gloucestershire,  where  he  held  a  situation  as 
schoolmaster.  The  request  seemed  reasonable.  I  consented, 
providing  she  was  quite  willing  to  go ;  and  the  young  man  took 
her  accordingly.  Time  passed  on.  We  had  no  correspondence. 
1  had  done  my  duty  to  my  dying  friend,  and  there  the  matter 
rested.  But  one  night  as  I  lay  in  bed  wakeful,  towards  morn- 
ing, turning  over  business  and  other  matters  in  my  mind,  I 
suddenly  became  conscious  that  there  was  some  one  in  the 
room.  Then  the  curtain  of  my  bed  was  drawn  aside,  and  there 
stood  my  departed  friend  gazing  at  me  with  a  sorrowful  and 
troubled  look.  I  felt  no  fear,  but  surprise  and  astonishment 
kept  me  silent.  He  spoke  to  me  distinctly  and  audibly  in  his 
own  familiar  voice,  and  said,  '  Friend  Happerfield,  I  have  come 
to  you  because  you  have  not  kept  your  promise  to  look  to  my 
wife.  She  is  in  trouble  and  in  want.'  I  assured  him  that  I  had 
done  my  duty,  and  was  not  aware  that  she  was  in  any  difficulty, 
and  that  I  would  see  about  her  first  thing,  and  have  her  attended 
to.  He  looked  satisfied  and  vanished  from  m}^  sight.  I  awoke 
my  wife,  who  was  asleep  at  my  side,  and  told  her  what  had 
occurred.  Sleep  departed  from  us,  and,  on  arising,  the  first 
thing  I  did  was  to  write  to  the  grandson.  In  reply  he  informed 
me  that  he  had  been  deprived  of  his  situation  through  persecu- 
tion, and  was  in  great  straits,  insomuch  that  he  had  decided  on 
sending  his  grandmother  to  the  Union.  Forthwith  I  sent  some 
money,  and  a  request  to  have  the  old  lady  forwarded  to  me 
immediately.  She  came,  and  was  again  provided  with  a  home 
and  had  her  wants  supplied.  These  are  the  circumstances  as 
they  occurred.  I  am  not  a  nervous  man  ;  nor  am  I  superstitious. 
At  the  time  my  old  friend  came  to  me  I  was  wide  awake, 
collected,  and  calm.     The  above  is  very  correct,  not  overdrawn. 

"G.  Happerfield." 

The  case  we  are  now  about  to  give  is  a  very 
complicated  one,  being  a  combination  of  apparitions, 
dreams,  premonitions,  and  mediumistic  phenomena.  It 
was  investigated  at  the  time,  and  more  or  less  vouched 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  445 

for,  by  the  Marquis  of  Bute,  Dr.  Ferrier,  and  Mr.  Andrew 
Lang.  Mr.  Myers  also  took  special  pains  to  investigate 
the  case,  and  interview  Mrs.  Claughton  personally.  He 
stated  that  she  was  "  a  widow  living  in  good  society, 
cheerful,  active,  has  seen  much  of  the  world,  and  a  good 
observer,  being  in  no  sense  morbid  or  hysterical."  In 
the  original  report,  published  in  vol.  xi.  of  the  Proceedings, 
there  are  three  long  narratives  signed  by  the  gentlemen 
whose  names  are  given  above,  and  the  case  covers  con- 
siderable space.  Here  w^e  must  be  brief  and  summarise 
it,  giving  chiefly  the  facts  bearing  upon  personal  identity. 
The  general  description  of  the  phenomena  is  as 
follows : — 

*'  Mrs.  Claughton  visits  a  house  reputed  haunted.  She  there 
twice  sees  a  phantasm  that  she  is  able  to  describe — the  descrip- 
tion suiting  a  deceased  lady  unknown  to  her  who  had  lived  in 
that  house.  There  is  external  evidence  to  the  fact  that  she 
twice  saw  this  phantom  and  was  greatly  impressed.  The 
phantom  appeared  to  speak  at  some  length,  and  made  many 
statements  of  facts  unknown  to  Mrs.  Claughton.  Some  of  these 
were  such  as  could  be  verified,  and  were  found  correct.  Others 
related  to  an  expedition  which  Mrs.  Claughton  was  enjoined  to 
make  to  a  village,  here  called  Meresby,  of  which  she  had  not 
previously  heard.  Certain  persons  whom  she  would  find  there 
were  described  by  name  and  with  other  details.  Certain 
incidents  of  her  future  journey  thither  were  also  described.  Mrs. 
Claughton  went  to  Meresby,  and  found  all  as  foretold.  She 
there  received  (as  had  also  been  foretold)  additional  communica- 
tions, and  she  then  obeyed  certain  orders  as  to  the  communica- 
tion of  facts  to  survivors.  That  she  made  the  journey,  and 
certain  subsequent  visits,  is  proved  by  external  evidence." 

Mrs.  Claughton's  first  experience  was  as  follows : — 
Living  in  a  house  she  knew  to  be  haunted,  she  was 
awakened  one  night  by  footsteps  of  a  person  coming 
downstairs.     The  steps  stopped  at  the  door.     The  sounds 


446  DEATH 

were  repeated  twice  more  at  an  interval  of  a  few  moments. 
Mrs.  Claugliton  rose,  lit  the  candle,  and  opened  the  door. 
There  was  no  one  there.  She  noticed  the  clock  outside 
was  1.20.  She  shut  the  door,  got  into  bed;  read,  and, 
leaving  the  candle  burning,  went  to  sleep.  Woke  up, 
finding  the  candle  spluttering  out.  Heard  a  sound  like 
a  sigh.  Saw  a  woman  standing  by  the  bed,  she  had  a 
soft  white  shawl  around  her  shoulders,  held  by  the  right 
hand  towards  the  left  shoulder,  bending  slightly  forward. 
She  said,  "  Follow  me."  Mrs.  Claughton  rose,  took  the 
candle,  and  followed  her  out  of  the  room,  across  the 
passage,  and  into  the  draAving-room.  She  had  no  recol- 
lection as  to  opening  the  doors.  The  housemaid,  next 
day,  declared  that  the  drawing-room  door  had  been 
locked  by  her.  On  entering  the  drawing-room,  Mrs. 
Claughton,  finding  the  candle  on  the  point  of  extinction, 
replaced  it  with  a  pink  one  from  the  chiffonier  near 
the  door.  The  figure  went  nearly  to  the  end  of  the 
room,  turned  three-quarters  round,  said,  "  To-morrow," 
and  disappeared.  Mrs.  Claughton  returned  to  the  bed- 
room, where  she  found  the  elder  child  (not  the  one  in 
bed)  sitting  up.  It  asked,  "  Who  is  the  lady  in  white  ? " 
Mrs.  Claughton  thinks  she  answered  the  child,  "  It  is 
only  me — mother;  go  to  sleep,"  or  the  like  words,  and 
hushed  her  to  sleep  in  her  arms.  The  baby  remained 
fast  asleep.  She  lit  the  gas,  and  remained  awake  for 
some  two  hours,  then  put  out  the  light  and  went  to 
sleep.  Had  no  fear  while  seeing  the  figure,  but  was 
upset  after  seeing  it.  Would  not  be  prepared  to  swear 
that  she  had  not  walked  in  her  sleep.  Pink  candle 
partly  burnt  in  her  room  next  morning.  Does  not  know 
if  she  took  it  burnt  or  new. 

The  next  night  the  figure  again  appeared  to  Mrs. 
Claughton.  The  latter  was  sitting  up  dressed,  with  the  gas 
burning.    She  (the  figure)  bent  down  over  Mrs.  Claughton, 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  447 

made  a  certain  statement,  and  asked  Mrs.  Claughton  to  do 
certain  things.  Mrs.  Claughton  said,  "  Am  I  dreaming,  or  is 
it  true  ?  "  The  figure  said,  "  If  you  doubt  me  you  will  find 
that  the  date  of  my  marriage  was.  .  .  ."  The  date  of  a 
marriage  in  India  was  then  given,  which  Mrs.  Claughton 
was  able  to  verify  the  following  Thursday  from  Dr.  Ferrier. 
After  this  Mrs.  Claughton  saw  a  man  standing  on  Mrs. 
B.'s  left  hand,  tall,  dark,  well-made,  healthy,  sixty  years 
old  or  more,  ordinary  man's  clothes,  kind,  good  expression. 
A  conversation  ensued  between  the  three,  in  the  course 
of  which  the  man  stated  himself  to  be  George  Howard, 
buried  in  Meresby  churchyard  (Mrs.  Claughton  had 
never  heard  of  Meresby  nor  of  George  Howard),  and 
gave  the  date  of  his  marriage.  These  dates  and  entries 
in  Mrs.  Claughton's  pocketbook  were  seen  and  verified 
by  Mr.  Myers.  He,  Howard,  desired  Mrs.  Claughton 
to  go  to  Meresby  and  verify  these  dates  from  the  registers, 
and,  if  found  correct,  to  go  to  the  church  at  1.15  a.m. 
and  wait  at  the  grave  therein  of  Kichard  Hart.  When 
Mrs.  Claughton  had  done  all  this  she  should  hear  the 
rest  of  the  history.  Towards  the  end  of  the  conversation 
Mrs.  Claughton  saw  a  third  phantom.  The  three  then 
disappeared.     Time,  1.20  a.m. 

Next  day  Mrs.  Claughton  found  that  Meresby  existed, 
but  took  no  steps  to  go  there.  Friday  night  Mrs. 
Claughton  dreamt  that  she  arrived  at  five,  after  dusk, 
and  that  a  fair  was  going  on.  The  next  day  she  missed 
the  proper  train,  and  did  not  arrive  in  Meresby  until 
dusk.  She  found  and  interviewed  Joseph  Wright,  whom 
George  Howard  had  described.  She  also  verified  dates 
in  registers.  After  that  she  slept,  and  had  a  dream  of  a 
terrifying  character,  whereof  has  full  written  description. 
Dark  night,  hardly  any  moon,  a  few  stars.  To  church 
with  Joseph  Wright,  1  a.m.,  with  whom  searched  the 
interior,  and  found  it  empty.     At   1.20   was  locked   in 


448  DEATH 

alone,  having  no  light ;  had  been  told  to  take  Bible,  but 
had  only  church  service,  which  she  had  left  in  the  vestry 
in  the  morning.  Waited  near  grave  of  Richard  Hart. 
Felt  no  fear.  Received  communication,  but  does  not 
feel  free  to  give  any  detail.  No  light.  History  begun 
at  Blake  Street  then  completed.  Was  directed  to  take 
another  white  rose  from  George  Howard's  grave,  and 
give  it  personally  to  his  daughter.  About  1.45  Joseph 
Wright  knocked,  and  let  Mrs.  Claughton  out.  Picked 
rose,  and  sent  as  directed.  Home,  to  bed,  and  slept  well 
for  the  first  time  since  seeing  first  apparition.  When 
delivering  rose  to  daughter  recognised  strong  likeness 
to  her  father — apparition  previously  seen.  The  wishes 
expressed  to  her  were  not  illogical  nor  unreasonable, 
as  dreams  often  appear,  but  clear,  connected,  and  of 
natural  importance. 

4.  Haunted  Houses. 

We  have  seen  from  the  foregoing  that  there  are 
numerous  cases  on  record  in  which  apparitions,  both  of 
the  living  and  of  the  dying,  have  appeared  to  friends 
and  relatives  at  great  distances,  at  times  coinciding  with 
either  the  illness  or  the  death  of  the  person  whose 
presence  the  figure  represented.  In  such  cases  it  was 
generally  possible  to  trace  the  time-connection  between 
the  apparition  seen  and  the  bodily  or  mental  illness  of  the 
agent ;  and,  in  that  manner,  we  were  enabled  definitely 
to  ascertain  that  there  is  some  time-connection  between 
the  two  events — either  due  to  chance  or  to  some  causal 
agency.  When,  however,  we  turn  to  phantasms  of  the 
dead,  we  have  no  such  time-connection  to  guide  us,  for 
the  reason  that  we  are  enabled  to  see,  as  it  were,  only 
one  end  of  the  line  ;  and  although  the  agent,  in  these 
cases,  might    be   actively    endeavouring   to   impress   the 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  449 

thoughts  of  his  hving  friend,  we  have  no  definite  froof 
of  the  fact;  and  all  such  cases  must  consequently  be 
treated  as  simple  hallucinations,  unless  additional  ex- 
ternal evidence  be  forthcoming  of  the  reality  of  the 
figure  seen,  or  its  cause.  Now,  in  cases  of  haunted  houses, 
we  have  apparent  instances  of  "  localised  "  apparitions — 
where  the  haunting  is  connected,  that  is,  with  some 
locality  rather  than  with  some  yerson ;  and  in  the 
majority  of  such  cases,  every  person  visiting  that  locality 
(at  least,  every  one  who  is  at  all  sensitive),  sees  the 
figure,  or  hears  sounds,  similar  to  those  experienced  by 
others. 

There  are  certain  facts  which,  if  established,  would 
indicate  that  some  external  intelligence  is  at  work  in  such 
cases,  and  that  they  are  not  mere  empty  hallucinations. 
Some  such  proofs  would  be  the  following: — (1)  That 
the  same  figure  was  seen  by  several  persons  at  the  same 
time,  and  described  by  them  in  identical  language. 
(2)  That  several  persons  in  succession,  each  individually, 
saw  the  same  figure  in  the  same  locality.  (3)  Cases  in 
which  a  figure  has  been  seen,  and  the  features  distin- 
guished, but  unrecognised  at  the  time;  later,  however, 
the  seer  has  been  enabled  to  identify  the  apparition 
as  a  former  occupant  of  the  house  by  selecting  a  photo- 
graph of  that  person  from  among  a  number  shown  him. 

Let  us  now  briefly  summarise  one  or  two  cases  of  this 
character,  in  order  that  the  reader  may  form  some  idea 
of  the  nature  of  the  evidence,  before  turning  to  the  theo- 
retical explanation.  One  most  interesting  case  of  this 
kind  is  published  in  Proceedings  of  the  Society  for  Psychical 
Research,  vol.  viii.,  pp.  311-32,  entitled,  "The  Record  of 
a  Haunted  House."  In  this  case  Miss  Morton,  who 
drew  up  the  report,  saw  a  figure  many  times  in  the 
house,  and  heard  its  footsteps.  Either  figure  or  foot- 
steps  were   also    seen    or    heard   by  her  sister  Mrs.  K., 

2f 


450  DEATH 

the  housemaid,  her  brother,  and  another  little  bo}', 
who  were  playing  outside,  her  sister  E.,  her  sister  M., 
Miss  Campbell,  W.  H.  C.  Morton,  F.  M.  K.,  Mrs. 
Brown,  Mrs.  Twining,  and  others.  Sometimes  a  number 
of  these  witnesses  would  hear  the  footsteps  of  the 
phantom  at  the  same  time — generally  at  night — and 
open  their  doors  leading  into  the  hall  simultaneously. 
Miss  Morton  herself  was  a  very  calm  and  careful  investi- 
gator. Not  only  did  she  endeavour  to  ascertain  any 
normal  cause  for  these  phenomena,  but  she  experimented 
in  every  way  possible  along  psychical  lines.  For  instance, 
she,  on  several  occasions,  fastened  fine  strings  across 
the  stairs  at  various  heights,  before  going  to  bed,  but 
after  all  others  had  gone  up  to  their  rooms.  They  were 
fastened  in  such  a  manner  that  the  slightest  touch  would 
displace  them,  but  yet  would  be  quite  invisible  at  night. 
Speaking  of  this  test,  she  says :  "  I  have  twice,  at  least, 
seen  the  figure  pass  through  the  cords  leaving  them 
intact."  She  also  saw  the  figure  disappear  several 
times;  saw  it  walk  through  doors  that  were  shut,  and 
on  several  occasions,  when  trying  to  touch  or  grasp  the 
figure,  found  that  it  invariably  evaded  her  clutch.  There 
is  also  strong  evidence  of  the  peculiar  behaviour  of  dogs 
and  other  animals  while  in  this  house.     Thus  : — 

"  Twice  I  remember  seeing  this  dog  suddenly  run  up  to  the 
mat  at  the  foot  of  the  stairs  in  the  hall  wagging  his  tail,  and 
moving  his  back  in  the  way  dogs  do  when  expecting  to  be 
caressed.  It  jumped  up,  fawning,  as  it  would  do  if  a  person 
had  been  standing  there,  but  suddenly  slunk  away  with  its  tail 
between  its  legs  and  retreated,  trembling,  under  the  sofa." 

A  case  of  remarkable  interest  is  that  investigated  by 
Miss  X.,  and  to  which  she  devoted  a  whole  book,  entitled. 

The  Alleged  Haunting  of  B House.      Miss  X.,  who  is 

highly  sensitive,  and  herself  a  psychic,  spent  several  weeks 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  451 

in  this  house,  keeping  throughout  a  minute  diary  of  all 
events  of  interest.  The  first  night  Miss  X.,  and  Miss 
Moore,  her  friend,  were  awakened  by  a  sound  which  they 
described  as  metal  struck  with  wood.  The  vision  called 
up  before  the  mind  by  the  sound  was  that  of  "  a  long 
metal  bar  struck  at  intervals  with  a  wooden  mallet."  It 
will  be  seen  from  this  description  that  the  sound  was  by 
no  means  small  in  volume ;  and,  in  fact,  both  Miss  X. 
and  her  friend,  as  well  as  the  servants,  were  instantly 
awakened  by  it.  The  next  night  the  sound  as  of  a 
man  readino-  aloud  was  heard.  These  sounds  continued 
in  frequency  and  in  violence  for  some  time ;  and,  a  little 
later  on,  figures,  mostly  of  nuns,  were  seen  by  Miss  X., 
and  other  inhabitants  of  the  house.  Animals  also  saw 
the  figures  in  this  case,  and  on  some  occasions  the  dog 
would  "  point "  and  run  to  the  figure,  expecting  to  be 
caressed  upon  reaching  it — only  to  find  nothing  there, 
— when  it  would  immediately  signify  its  astonishment 
by  prolonged  barking  and  howling.  The  inmates  of  the 
house  tried  on  several  occasions  to  imitate  the  sounds 
which  they  heard,  by  striking  the  pipes,  knocking  the 
fire-irons  together,  knocking  upon  the  roof,  &c.  But  in 
no  case  could  they  make  as  much  noise  as  the  haunting 
influence  made  each  night  !  Many  attempts  were  made 
at  automatic  writing  and  at  crystal  gazing,  during  the 
occupancy  of  the  house,  but  with  no  very  definite  results. 
Many  spontaneous  phenomena  of  great  interest  occurred, 
however,  of  which  the  following  is  a  sample : — 

"I  had  an  experience  this  morning  which  may  have  been 
purely  subjective,  but  which  should  be  recorded.  About  10  a.m., 
I  was  writing  in  the  library,  face  to  light,  back  to  fire.  Mrs.  W. 
was  in  the  room,  and  addressed  me  once  or  twice ;  but  I  was 
aware  of  not  being  responsive,  as  I  was  much  occupied.  I  wrote 
on,  and  presently  felt  a  distinct^  but  gentle  push  against  my 
chair.     I  thought  it  was  the  dog,  and  looked  down,  but  he  was 


452  DEATH 

not  there.  I  went  on  writing,  and  in  a  few  minutes  felt  a  push, 
firm  and  decided,  against  myself,  which  moved  me  on  my  chair. 
I  thought  it  was  Mrs.  W.,  who,  having  spoken  and  obtained 
no  answer,  was  reminding  me  of  her  presence.  I  looked  back- 
ward with  an  exclamation — the  room  was  empty.  She  came  in 
directly,  and  called  my  attention  to  the  dog,  who  was  gazing 
intently  from  the  hearth-rug  at  the  place  where  I  had  expected 
(before)  to  see  him." 

The  end  of  the  stay  in  this  house  was  quite  unpleasant. 
The  phenomena,  it  is  true,  became  less  frequent,  and  less 
aggressive,  as  the  weeks  went  by,  but  Miss  X.  was  forced 
to  write  on  May  3rd  : — 

"  The  general  tone  of  things  is  disquieting,  and  new  in  our 
experience.  Hitherto,  in  our  first  occupation,  the  phenomena 
affected  one  as  melancholy,  depressing,  and  perplexing,  but  all 
now,  quite  independently,  say  the  same  thing, — that  the  influ- 
ence is  evil  and  horrible, — even  poor  Spooks  (dog)  was  never 
terrified  before,  as  she  has  been  since  our  return  here.  The 
worn  faces  at  breakfast  are  really  a  dismal  sight"  (p.  210). 

Many  cases  of  a  like  nature  could  be  cited,  but  space 
does  not  permit.  It  is  evident  to  any  impartial  student 
of  the  records  that  supernormal  phenomena  do  undoubt- 
edly occur  in  haunted  houses,  and  the  question  narrows 
itself  down  to  their  intoyretation.  The  supernormal 
nature  of  the  facts  once  granted,  this  question  becomes 
one  of  deep  interest. 

Various  theories  have  been  advanced  from  time  to 
time  to  explain  these  facts.  Some  have  thought  that  a 
sort  of  atmosphere  exists  in  and  about  a  house  of  this 
nature,  permeating  it  as  its  physical  atmosphere  might, 
and  affecting  the  minds  and  senses  of  all  inhabitants  of 
that  house,  sensitive  enough  to  perceive  this  influence. 
Others  have  thought  that  the  figures  seen  represented 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  453 

actual  spiritual  forms  or  bodies  (which  is  the  popular 
interpretation  of  the  facts).  Still  others  have  contended 
that  thouo^ht-transference  between  the  living^  would 
account  for  these  phenomena,  the  first  percipient  ex- 
periencing a  simple  hallucination  (subsequent  figures 
representing,  on  this  theory,  but  a  recurrence  of  the 
hallucination),  and  when  this  tenant  moved,  and  others 
took  his  place,  the  phantom  would  be  handed  on,  as  it 
were,  by  telepathy,  from  the  original  occupant  !  A  fourth 
class  of  thinkers  holds  that  a  species  of  telepathy  from 
the  dead  is  the  best  hypothesis  to  explain  the  facts.  On 
this  theory  we  have  the  analogies  of  hallucination  and 
telepathy  to  guide  us :  the  figure  would  be  an  halluci- 
nation, and  have  no  external  existence,  any  more  than 
do  the  figures  in  a  feverish  dream  ;  but  it  was  initiated, 
nevertheless,  by  some  external  source  or  mind,  and 
for  that  reason  cannot  be  classed  as  purely  suhjective. 
Telepathy  from  the  mind  of  the  dead  person  would 
explain  many  of  the  facts,  but  it  is  very  doubtful  if  it 
would  explain  them  cell.  In  view  of  the  evidence  we 
have  presented  for  the  existence  of  a  spiritual,  or  ethe- 
rial,  or  semi-material  body,  it  is  to  many  of  us  far  easier 
to  conceive  that  real  entities  are  operative  within  the 
house  than  to  imagine  any  such  complicated  hypothesis. 
The  fact  that  various  figures  are  seen ;  the  fact  that 
animals  behave  in  the  manner  they  do,  in  such  houses ; 
the  fact  that  on  some  occasions  it  is  reported  that  two 
independent  witnesses  have  seen  the  same  figure  from  a 
different  angle,  and  described  it  as  they  would,  if  they 
were  viewing  a  real  figure — all  this  would  seem  to  indi- 
cate that  some  ethereal  body  is  present  in  at  least  some 
instances.  What  the  final  verdict  ma}''  be  on  cases  of 
this  character  it  is  hard  to  say.  The  only  thing  that 
remains  definite  and  clear  is  that  all  cases  of  haunted 
houses    should    be     investigated    carefully    by    trained 


454  DEATH 

experts,  and  the  results  impartially  recorded.  Were  this 
done,  we  might  hope  that,  in  the  course  of  three  or  four 
hundred  years,  some  definite  progress  would  be  made  in 
this  field  of  research  ! 

5.  Planchette  Writing. 

The  case  we  are  about  to  give  is  reported  by  Mr. 
Hensleigh  Wedgwood  (the  cousin  and  brother-in-law 
of  Charles  Darwin,  and  himself  a  well-known  savant),  and 
the  automatic  writing  was  obtained  through  the  instru- 
mentality of  his  own  wife.  It  comes,  therefore,  from  an 
exceptionally  authentic  source,  and,  no  matter  how  we 
may  choose  to  interpret  these  facts,  the  hona  fides  of  the 
Avitnesses  can  hardly  be  questioned. 

Planchette  Writing  in  the  Normal  State. 

This  case  appeared  originally  in  the  Journal  of  the  Society 
for  Psychical  Research,  but  was  reprinted  in  the  Proceedings, 
vol.  ix.,  pp.  93-7.     It  runs  as  follows  : — 

*'  *  A  spirit  is  here  to-day  who  we  think  will  be  able  to  write 
through  the  medium.  Hold  very  steady,  and  he  will  try  to 
draw.' 

"  We  turned  the  page,  and  a  sketch  was  made,  rudely  enough 
of  course,  but  with  apparent  care. 

" '  Very  sorry  can't  do  better.  Was  meant  for  test.  Must 
write  for  you  instead. — J.  G.' 

"  We  did  not  fully  understand  the  first  drawing,  taking  it  for 
two  arms  and  hands  clasped,  one  coming  down  from  above.  Mr. 
Wedgwood  asked  the  spirit  of  J.  G.  to  try  again,  which  he  did. 

"  Before  the  drawing  he  wrote  :  '  Now  look.'  We  did,  and 
this  time  comprehended  an  arm  and  sword. 

" '  Now  I  will  write  for  you  if  you  like.' 

"  Mr.  W.  :  '  What  did  the  drawing  represent?' 

'' '  Something  that  was  given  me.' 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  455 

"  I  said,  *  Are  you  a  man  or  a  woman  ? ' 

'"Man,  John  G.' 

"  Mr.  W. :  '  How  was  it  given  to  you  ? ' 

" '  On  paper  and  other  things.  My  head  is  bad  from  the  old 
wound  I  got  there  when  I  try  to  write  through  mediums.' 

"  Mr.  W. :  'We  don't  know  J.  G.  Have  you  anything  to  do 
with  us  ? ' 

"  '  No  connection.' 

"Mr.  W.  said  he  knew  a  J.  Giffard,  and  wondered  if  that 
was  the  same. 

'* '  Not  Giffard.     Gurwood.' 

"  Mr.  W.  suggested  that  he  had  been  killed  in  storming 
some  fort. 

"  '  I  killed  myself  on  Christmas  Day,  years  ago.  I  wish  I 
had  died  fighting.' 

"  '  Were  you  a  soldier? ' 

"  '  I  was  in  the  army.' 

"  '  Can  you  name  what  rank  ? ' 

"  '  No,  it  was  the  pen  that  did  for  me,  and  not  the  sword.' 

"The  word  pen  was  imperfectly  written,  and  I  thought  it  was 
meant  iov  fall.     I  asked  if  this  was  right? 

" '  No.' 

''  Mr.  W. :  'Is  the  word  pen  ?  ' 

"  'Yes,  pen  did  for  me.' 

"We  suggested  that  he  was  an  author  who  had  failed,  or  had 
been  maligned. 

" '  I  did  not  fail.  I  was  not  slandered.  Too  much  for  me 
after  .   .  .  pen  was  too  much  for  me  after  the  wound.' 

"  '  Where  were  you  wounded,  and  when  did  you  die  ? ' 

"  '  Peninsula  to  first  question.' 

"  We  were  not  sure  about  the  word  Peninsula,  and  asked  him 
to  repeat. 

"  '  I  was  wounded  in  the  head  in  Peninsula.  It  will  be  forty- 
four  years  next  Christmas  Day  since  I  killed  myself.  Oh,  my 
head  ...  I  killed  myself.     John  Gurwood.' 

"  '  Where  did  you  die  ? ' 

"'I  had  my  wound  in  1810.  I  cannot  tell  you  more  about 
myself.     The  drawing  as  a  test.' 


456  DEATH 

"  We  asked  if  the  device  was  intended  for  his  crest. 
"  '  I  had  it,  seal.' 

"  '  Had  it  anything  to  do  with  your  wound? ' 
"  '  It  came  from  that,    and   was  given  me.     Power  fails  to 
explain.     Remember  my  name.     Stop  now.' " 

Later,  the  following  was  obtained : — 

"  '  Sword — when  I  broke  in,  on  the  table  with  plan  or  fortress 
— belonged  to  my  prisoner ;  I  will  tell  you  his  name  to-night. 
It  was  on  the  table  when  I  broke  in.  He  did  not  expect  me  ; 
I  took  him  unawares.  He  was  in  his  room,  looking  at  a  plan, 
and  the  sword  was  on  the  table.  Will  try  and  let  you  know  how 
I  took  the  sword  to-night.' 

"  In  the  evening  after  dinner  : — 

"  '  I  fought  my  way  in.     His  name  was  Banier '  (three  times 

repeated).     '  The  sword  was  lying  on  the  table,  by  a  written 

cheme  of  defence.     Oh,  my  head  !     Banier  had  a  plan  written 

out  for  the  defence  of  the  fortress.     It  was  lying  on  the  table, 

and  his  sword  was  by  it.' 

"  To  a  question  :  '  Yes ;  surprised  him.' 

"  Kow,  when  these  facts  came  to  be  verified,  the  following 
was  found.  None  of  those  having  their  hands  on  the  board 
knew  anything  whatever  about  these  facts,  and  considerable 
letter-writing  had  to  be  gone  through,  in  order  to  verify  them. 

"  When  I  came  to  verify  the  message  of  the  planchette,  I 
speedily  found  that  Colonel  Gurwood,  the  editor  of  the  Duke's 
despatches,  led  the  forlorn  hope  at  the  storming  of  Ciudad 
Rodrigo,  in  1812,  and  received  a  wound  in  the  skull  from  a 
musket  ball  which  affected  him  for  the  remainder  of  his  life. 
In  recognition  of  the  bravery  shown  on  that  occasion  he  received 
a  grant  of  arms  in  1812,  and  the  Duke  of  Wellington  presented 
him  with  the  sword  of  the  Governor,  who  had  been  taken 
prisoner  by  Captain  Gurwood. 

*'The  services  thus  specified  were  symbolised  in  the  crest, 
*  Out  of  a  mural  coronet,  a  castle  ruined  in  the  centre,  and 
therefrom  an  arm  in  armour  embowed,  holding  a  scimitar.' 

"  In  accordance  with  the  assertion  of  the  planchette,  Colonel 
Gurwood    killed    himself   on    Christmas    Day,    1845,   and   the 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  457 

Annual  Register  of  that  year,  after  narrating  the  suicide,  says  : 
'  It  is  thought  that  this  laborious  undertaking  (the  editing  the 
despatches)  produced  a  relaxation  of  the  nervous  system  and 
consequent  depression  of  spirits.  In  a  fit  of  despondency  the 
unfortunate  gentleman  terminated  his  life.'  " 

In  such  a  case  as  the  above,  the  absurdity  of  attempt- 
ing to  explain  the  facts  by  any  theory  of  telepathy  should 
be  apparent.  There  is  only  one  rational  explanation  of 
the  incident, — if  we  rule  out  conscious  fraud,  as  we  must 
in  this  case,  owing  to  the  high  social  position  of  the 
recorders.     That  explanation  is  spiritism. 

6.  The  Case  of  Mrs.  Piper. 

The  primary  question  that  concerns  us  in  this  place 
is  the  truth  of  personal  identity — since  only  in  that 
manner  can  persistence  of  consciousness,  or  what  is 
usually  known  as  "  the  immortality  of  the  soul,"  be 
proved.  In  order  that  the  reader  may  understand  the 
problem  aright,  it  is  necessary  for  him  to  realise,  first 
of  all,  the  position  and  strength  of  materialism.  That 
doctrine  tells  us  that  consciousness  is  a  mere  function  or 
product  of  brain-activity,  and  that,  when  this  organ 
ceases  to  function,  consciousness  must  come  to  an 
abrupt  termination — as,  of  course,  would  be  the  case  at 
death.  Just  as  digestion,  circulation,  secretion,  &c.,  do 
not  continue  after  the  disintegration  of  the  organs  upon 
which  these  functions  depend ;  so,  it  is  contended,  con- 
sciousness cannot  persist  after  the  destruction  of  the 
brain- — upon  the  functional  activity  of  which  it  depends. 
Consciousness,  in  short,  is  supposed  to  be  intimately 
bound  up  with  nervous  activity,  and  with  the  nervous 
system,  and  there  is  no  evidence,  it  is  claimed,  for  the 
activity  or  persistence  of  any  consciousness,  except  in 
connection  with  such  nerve   activity.     And,  outside  of 


458  DEATH 

the  facts  classed  under  the  general  heading  of  psychic 
research,  it  will  be  seen  that  there  is  no  such  evidence — 
at  least  none  that  would  appeal  to  the  scientific  man. 
To  those  who  are  content  to  rely  upon  faith,  or  to  whom 
any  of  the  arguments  we  have  advanced  appeal  as 
sufficiently  conclusive  to  warrant  belief  in  survival,  we 
have,  of  course,  no  further  word  to  say.  But  there  are 
a  large  number  of  critics — and  among  these  may  be 
classed  most  scientific  men — who  feel  that  such  evidence 
is  not  conclusive,  and  that  facts  will  have  to  be  adduced, 
answering  the  position  of  materialism,  if  that  doctrine 
is  ever  to  be  overthrown.  It  will  be  seen  at  once  that 
the  only  way  to  meet  this  objection  is  to  produce  such 
facts ;  and  they  consist,  primarily,  in  proofs  of  the  fact 
that  an  individual  consciousness — one  known  to  us 
previously,  let  us  say — does  continue  to  exist  after  the 
death  of  the  body.  The  evidence  desired  in  order  to 
prove  this,  and  the  only  evidence  that  ever  will  prove 
it,  is  the  establishment  of  the  identity  of  the  deceased 
person ;  and  it  will  be  seen  that  this  can  only  be  done 
by  obtaining  specific  facts  and  details  from  that  con- 
sciousness, which  were  known  to  it  when  alive,  but  which 
were  presumably  in  the  possession  of  no  other  conscious- 
ness. If  we  could  get  in  touch,  directly  or  indirectly, 
with  what  claimed  to  be  such  a  consciousness,  therefore, 
and  it  could  produce  for  us  certain  facts  known  only  to 
it  when  alive  (which  facts  we  were  enabled  afterwards  to 
verify),  then  we  should  have  fairly  good  evidence  for  the 
belief  that  such  an  individual  intelligence  was  operative  in 
the  case  before  us.  When  once  the  facts  pass  beyond  the 
limits  of  chance,  guessing,  inference,  telepathy,  and  clair- 
voyance, and  when  the  honesty  of  the  medium  has  been 
proved,  there  would  seem  to  be  no  other  alternative  than 
to  accept  the  doctrine  of  spiritism,  as  at  least  a  thinkable 
and  working  hypothesis.     Now  let  us  see  what  the  facts 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  459 

are  that  have  been  obtained  by  investigations  of  this 
nature. 

The  most  famous  medium  through  whom  we  have 
obtained  messages  of  this  character  is  Mrs.  Piper — well 
known  to  all  students  of  psychic  research.  We  shall 
summarise  a  small  part  of  the  evidence  that  has  been 
obtained  through  the  instrumentality  of  this  medium — 
after  first  describing  the  conditions  under  which  the 
communications  are  received. 

Mrs.  Piper  passes  into  trance  (the  reahty  of  which  has 
been  attested  frequently  by  physicians  and  others),  in 
which  state  she  remains  for  about  two  hours.  (See  Ap- 
pendix D.)  During  that  time  the  voice  speaks,  or  more 
frequently  the  hand  writes — the  content  of  the  message 
being,  it  will  be  seen,  the  problem  to  be  solved  in  this 
case,  and  not  the  method  of  its  production.  The  writing 
is  read  at  the  time  by  the  sitter,  who  asks  questions  of 
the  medium's  hand  (not  ear),  which  comes  up  to  his 
mouth  for  the  purpose.  When  this  hand  converses  with 
a  spirit,  so-called,  it  is  raised  into  space,  and  is  extended 
at  arm's  length,  slightly  elevated.  The  hand  then  comes 
down,  and  writes  upon  a  pad  of  paper  the  information 
that  is  received.  In  this  manner  the  messages  are 
obtained. 

The  First  English  Experiments. 

Mrs.  Piper  was  taken  to  England  in  November  1889, 
so  that  the  group  of  eminent  investigators  in  that  country 
— Sir  Oliver  Lodge,  Professor  Walter  Leaf,  Professor 
Henry  Sidgwick,  Mr.  F.  W.  H.  Myers,  and  others — might 
test  the  powers  that  had  proved  so  mystifying  to  American 
students  of  psychical  research.  As  Mr.  Myers  says,  every 
precaution  was  taken  to  make  fraud  impossible : — 

"  Professor  Lodge  met  her  on  tlie  Liverpool  landing-stage, 
November  19,  and  conducted  her  to  a  hotel,  where  I  joined  her 


4G0  DEATH 

on  Kovember  20,  and  escorted  her  with  her  children  to  Cam- 
bridge. She  stayed  first  in  my  house  ;  and  I  am  convinced  that 
she  brought  with  her  a  very  slender  knowledge  of  English 
affairs  and  English  people.  The  servant  who  attended  on  her 
and  on  her  two  young  children  was  chosen  by  myself,  and  was 
a  young  woman  from  a  country  village,  whom  I  had  full  reason 
to  believe  to  be  trustworthy,  and  also  quite  ignorant  of  my  own 
or  my  friend's  affairs.  For  the  most  part  I  had  myself  not 
determined  upon  the  persons  whom  I  would  invite  to  sit  with 
her.  I  chose  these  sitters  in  great  measure  by  chance ;  several 
of  them  were  not  residents  in  Cambridge ;  and,  except  in  one  or 
two  cases  where  anonymity  would  have  been  hard  to  preserve, 
I  brought  them  to  her  under  false  names — sometimes  intro- 
ducing them  only  when  the  trance  had  already  begun." 

In  the  report  raade  by  Sir  Oliver  Lodge,  a  description 
of  the  precautionary  measures  adopted  at  other  times  is 
given. 

"Mrs.  Piper's  correspondence  was  small,"  he  says,  "some- 
thing like  three  letters  a  week,  even  when  the  children  were 
away  from  her.  The  outsides  of  her  letters  nearly  always 
passed  through  my  hands,  and  often  the  insides,  too,  by  her 
permission. 

"  The  servants  were  all,  as  it  happened^  new,  having  been 
obtained  by  my  wife  through  ordinary  local  inquiries  and 
registry  offices,  just  about  the  time  of  Mrs.  Piper's  visit.  Con- 
sequently they  were  entirely  ignorant  of  family  connections, 
and  could  have  told  nothing,  however  largely  they  had  been 
paid.  The  ingenious  suggestion  has  been  made  that  they  were 
her  spies.  Knowing  the  facts,  1  will  content  myself  with 
asserting  that  they  had  absolutely  no  connection  with  her  of 
any  sort.   .   .  . 

"  In  order  to  give  better  evidence,  I  obtained  permission,  and 
immediately  thereafter  personally  overhauled  the  whole  of  her 
luggage.  Directories,  biographies,  Men  of  Our  Time,  and  such- 
like books  were  entirely  absent.  In  fact,  there  were  scarcely 
any  books  at  all.   .   .   .   Strange  sitters  frequently  arrived   at 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  461 

11  A.M.,  and  I  admitted  them  myself  straight  into  the  room 
where  we  were  going  to  sit ;  they  were  shortly  after  introduced 
to  Mrs.  Piper  under  some  assumed  name." 

Although  the  report  specifies  other  similar  methods 
that  were  adopted  to  anticipate,  and,  if  possible,  prevent 
fraud,  these  are  sufficient  to  indicate  that  the  tests  re- 
ceived, such  as  they  were,  are  of  some  value  from  an 
evidential  point  of  view. 

At  the  first  sittmg  with  Sir  Oliver  Lodge,  Mrs.  Piper 
gave  a  correct  description  of  Mrs.  Lodge's  father,  but  the 
name  was  incorrectly  given  as  "  Uncle  William,"  a  mistake 
that  was  subsequently  rectified.  An  "  Aunt  Ann  "  was 
also  described  correctly,  both  as  to  her  personal  ap- 
pearance and  characteristics.  The  name  was  also  given, 
and  the  fact  was  mentioned  that  she  had  been  the  one 
to  care  for  Professor  Lodge  after  the  death  of  his 
mother.  Professor  Lodge  was  also  asked  if  he  still 
possessed  "  the  little  old-fashioned  picture  of  her,  on 
a  small  card,"  and  she  seemed  pleased  when  he  said  that 
he  had  kept  it.  She  also  announced  that  she  was  now 
caring  for  Professor  Lodge's  child,  who  had  died  when 
very  young  (a  fact  that  Mrs.  Piper  may  or  may  not  have 
known),  but  the  failure  to  state  the  sex  of  this  child 
correctly  at  the  first  attempt  throws  the  shadow  of  doubt 
upon  the  test.  The  immediate  cause  of  "  Aunt  Ann's  " 
death  was  also  given  incorrectly. 

At  the  second  sitting  Mrs.  Lodge's  father  again  professed 
to  appear,  although  he  seemed  to  find  great  difficulty  in 
making  himself  clear.  At  last  Phinuit  took  the  matter  in 
hand : — 

*'  '  He  says,'  said  the  control,  '  you  have  got  something  of  his. 
He  says  if  you  had  this  it  would  help  him.  .  .  .  It's  a  little 
ornament  with  his  hair  in  it.'  Mrs.  Lodge  immediately  recog- 
nised the  ornament  referred  to.  It  was  a  locket  containing 
some  strands  of  hair,  but  she  had  never  known  whose  hair  it 


462  DEATH 

contained.  Upon  the  appearance  of  the  locket  it  was  identified, 
and  the  statement  was  made  that  it  had  been  given  by  the  father 
to  Mrs.  Lodge's  mother.  The  name  *  Alexander '  was  given  as 
that  of  the  father.  Both  statements  were  correct.  After  some 
rather  rambling  statements,  Phinuit  took  affairs  in  his  own 
hands  again.  '  He  had  an  illness  and  passed  out  with  it,'  said 
the  control.  '  He  tried  to  speak  to  Mary,  his  wife,  and  stretched 
out  his  hand  to  her,  but  couldn't  reach,  and  fell  and  passed  away. 
That's  the  last  thing  he  remembers  in  this  mortal  body.'  " 

It  was  also  stated  that  he  had  had  trouble  with  his 
right  leg ;  that  it  was  due  to  a  fall ;  that  it  was  below  the 
knee;  and  that  it  gave  him  pain  sometimes.  In  describ- 
ing him  further,  Phinuit  stated  that  he  had  much  trouble 
with  his  teeth ;  that  he  travelled  a  great  deal ;  and  wore 
a  uniform  with  "  big  bright  buttons  "  on  it. 

All  these  statements  were  absolutely  correct.  He  had 
been  a  captain  in  the  merchant  service,  and,  as  the  natural 
consequence,  travelled  almost  continuously.  There  vjere 
big  bright  buttons  on  his  uniform.  On  one  of  his  trips  he 
had  fallen  down  the  hold  and  broken  his  right  leg  below 
the  knee,  and  this  sometimes  pained  him  severely.  He 
also  suffered  severely  from  toothache ;  and  the  facts 
attending  his  death  were  very  accurately  described. 

Inquiries  were  made  regarding  "  Uncle  William,"  whose 
name  had  first  been  given  instead  of  that  of  the  father, 
and  Phinuit  announced  : — 

"  '  Never  saw  a  spirit  so  happy  and  contented.  He  was 
depressed  in  life — had  blues  like  old  Harry,  but  he's  quite 
contented  now.  He  had  trouble  there  [prodding  himself  in 
lower  half  of  the  stomach,  and  me  over  bladder].  Trouble 
there,  in  bowels  or  something.  Had  pain  in  head ;  right 
eye  funny.  Pain  down  here,  abdomen ;  stoppage  urine.  Had 
an  operation,  and  after  it  was  worse,  and  with  it  passed  out.' " 

Although  the  name  of  "  Uncle  William  '  was  given  at 
the  first  sitting,  it  was  not  until  a  subsequent  occasion 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  463 

that  the  full  name,  William  Tomkinson,  was  produced. 
It  was  then  stated  that  he  was  an  old  man  with  white 
hair  and  beard,  and  the  trouble  with  the  bladder  was 
again  insisted  upon.  In  verification  of  these  facts. 
Professor  Lodge  says  that  he  used  to  have  just  such 
severe  fits  of  depression  as  Phinuit  described :  "  His 
right  eye  had  a  droop  in  it.  He  had  stone  in  bladder, 
great  trouble  with  urine,  and  was  operated  on  towards 
the  end  by  Sir  Henry  Thompson." 

At  the  second  sitting  Mrs.  Lodge's  father's  name  was 
given  in  full,  "  Alexander  Marshall,"  with  more  particulars 
concerning  the  injury  to  his  leg  by  a  fall  "  through  a  hole 
in  the  boat."  Mention  was  also  made  to  "  two  Florences," 
with  the  information  that  one  painted  and  the  other  did 
not ;  that  one  was  married  and  the  other  was  single,  and 
that  it  is  "  the  one  who  doesn't  paint  who  is  married." 
This  was  true,  as  Professor  Lodge  had  two  cousins  of  the 
name  of  Florence,  and  the  description  fitted  exactly. 
Phinuit  continued,  however,  by  saying  that  the  married 
cousin  had  a  friend  named  "  Whiteman,"  who  had  some- 
thing the  matter  with  her  head.  As  this  information 
was  unintelligible  to  all  the  sitters,  Professor  Lodge  wrote 
to  this  cousin  and  learned  that  the  lady's  friend  was 
"  Whytehead,"  but  that,  so  far  as  known,  she  was  in  good 
health.  Apparently  the  "  head  trouble  "  was  a  confusion 
resulting  from  the  termination  of  the  name. 

In  the  course  of  these  sittings  Professor  Lodge  and 
others  received  several  communications  indicating  super- 
normal knowledge  of  earthly  afiairs.  Some  were  of  too 
personal  a  nature  to  be  given  to  the  public.  At  one 
sitting,  however,  a  gentleman  (Mr.  G.  H.  Kendall)  was 
introduced  as  "  Mr.  Roberts."  During  the  experiment  he 
placed  a  locket  in  Mrs.  Piper's  hand — a  locket  containing 
a  miniature  head  of  a  first  (step)  cousin,  named  "  Agnes," 
who  had  died  of  consumption  in  1869.     This  picture  was 


464  DEATH 

faced  by  a  ring  of  hair,  but,  as  the  locket  remained 
closed,  there  was  no  ordinary  way  in  which  Mrs.  Piper 
could  have  ascertained  these  facts.  Instantly  Phinuit 
announced  that  the  object  was  associated  with  an  old 
friend,  and  the  name  "  Aleese  "  was  given,  incorrectly,  of 
course,  although  the  pronunciation  is  explained  by  the 
fact  that  this  control,  assuming  to  be  a  French  physician, 
frequently  spoke  with  a  French  accent.  When  he  was 
informed  that  he  had  made  a  mistake  in  the  name,  he 
excused  himself  by  saying  that  "  It  is  the  cough  she 
remembers — she  passed  out  with  a  cough,"  and  he 
immediately  gave  the  name  as  "Agnese,"  nor  was  he 
able  to  give  a  better  interpretation,  even  using  the  name 
"  Anyese  "  during  the  remainder  of  the  sitting.  While 
much  of  the  information  given  was  of  a  character  that 
could  not  be  regarded  as  particularly  evidential,  he  gave 
a  number  of  facts  that  were  surprisingly  correct.  Thus, 
he  announced  that  "  She's  got  greyish  eyes  and  brown 
hair  "  ;  "  she  passed  out  with  a  cough  "  ;  "  when  she 
passed  out  she  lost  flesh,  but  she  looks  better  now — 
looks  more  like  the  picture  you  have  in  here  "  (indicating 
the  locket),  "  rather  fleshier."  Then  he  added :  "  There 
was  a  book,  when  she  was  in  the  body,  connected  with 
you  and  her — a  little  book  and  some  verses  in  it."  And, 
finally,  "  That's  her  hair  in  there  "  (pointing  to  the  locket 
again). 

As  a  matter  of  fact  every  statement  was  practically 
correct,  even  in  regard  to  "  the  book,"  for  Mr.  Kendall 
had,  as  a  keepsake,  her  "  Roundell  Palmer's  Booh  of 
Praised  There  was  some  confusion  and  error  in  the 
subsequent  communications,  with  a  few  facts  of  evi- 
dential value,  the  particulars  of  which  may  be  found  in 
Sir  Oliver  Lodge's  reports. 

The  most  important  experiment,  however,  occurred  at 
one  of  the  early  sittings.     It  is  quoted  entire : — 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  465 

"  It  happened  that  an  uncle  of  mine  in  London,  now  quite  an 
old  man,  and  one  of  a  surviving  three  out  of  a  large  family,  had 
a  twin  brother  who  died  twenty  or  more  years  ago.  I  interested 
him  generally  in  the  subject,  and  wrote  to  ask  if  he  would  lend 
me  some  relic  of  this  brother.  By  morning  post  on  a  certain 
day  I  received  a  curious  old  gold  watch  which  this  brother  had 
worn  and  been  fond  of ;  and  that  same  morning,  no  one  in  the 
house  having  seen  or  knowing  anything  about  it,  I  handed  it  to 
Mrs.  Piper  when  in  a  state  of  trance. 

"  I  was  told  almost  immediately  that  it  had  belonged  to  one 
of  my  uncles — one  that  had  been  mentioned  before  as  having 
died  from  the  effects  of  a  fall — one  that  had  been  very  fond  of 
Uncle  Robert,  the  name  of  the  survivor — that  the  watch  was 
now  in  possession  of  this  same  Uncle  Robert,  with  whom  he  was 
anxious  to  communicate.  After  some  difficulty  and  many  wrong 
attempts,  Dr.  Phinuit  caught  the  name  Jerry,  short  for 
Jeremiah,  and  said  emphatically,  as  if  a  third  person  was 
speaking  :  *  This  is  my  watch,  and  Robert  is  my  brother,  and  I 
am  here.  Uncle  Jerry,  my  watch.'  All  this  at  the  first  sitting 
on  the  very  morning  the  watch  had  arrived  by  post,  no  one  but 
myself  and  a  shorthand  clerk,  who  happened  to  have  been 
introduced  for  the  first  time  at  this  sitting  by  me,  and  whose 
antecedents  are  well  known  to  me,  being  present. 

"  Having  thus  got  ostensibly  into  communication  through 
some  means  or  other  with  what  purported  to  be  a  deceased 
relative  whom  I  had,  indeed,  known  slightly  in  his  later  years 
of  blindness,  but  of  whose  early  life  I  knew  nothing,  I  pointed 
out  to  him  that  to  make  Uncle  Robert  aware  of  his  presence  it 
would  be  well  to  recall  trivial  details  of  their  boyhood,  all  of 
which  I  would  faithfully  report.  He  quite  caught  the  idea,  and 
proceeded  during  several  successive  sittings  ostensibly  to  instruct 
Dr.  Phinuit  to  mention  a  number  of  little  things  such  as  would 
enable  his  brother  to  recognise  him.  Reference  to  his  blindness, 
illness,  and  main  facts  of  his  life  were  comparatively  useless  from 
my  point  of  view  ;  but  these  details  of  boyhood  two-thirds  of  a 
century  ago  were  utterly  and  entirely  out  of  my  ken.  My  father 
was  one  of  the  younger  members  of  the  family,  and  only  knew 
these  brothers  as  men. 

2g 


466  DEATH 

" '  Uncle  Jerry '  recalled  episodes  such  as  swimming  the 
creek  when  they  were  boys  together,  and  running  some  risk  of 
getting  drowned  ;  killing  a  cat  in  Smith's  field ;  the  possession 
of  a  small  rifle  and  of  a  long  peculiar  skin,  like  a  snake-skin, 
which  he  thought  was  now  in  the  possession  of  Uncle  Robert. 

"  All  these  facts  have  been  more  or  less  completely  verified. 
But  the  interesting  thing  is  that  this  twin  brother,  from  whom 
I  got  the  watch,  and  with  whom  I  was  in  a  sort  of  communica- 
tion, could  not  remember  them  all.  He  recollected  something 
about  swimming  the  creek,  though  he  himself  had  merely  looked 
on.  He  had  a  distinct  recollection  of  having  had  the  snake- 
skin,  and  of  the  box  in  which  it  was  kept,  though  he  does  not 
know  where  it  is  now.  But  he  altogether  denied  killing  the  cat, 
and  could  not  recall  Smith's  field. 

"  His  memory,  however,  is  decidedly  failing  him,  and  he  was 
good  enough  to  write  to  another  brother,  Frank,  now  living  in 
Cornwall,  an  old  sea  captain,  and  ask  him  if  he  had  any  better 
remembrance  of  certain  facts,  of  course  not  giving  any  inexplic- 
able reason  for  asking.  The  result  of  this  inquiry  was  trium- 
phantly to  vindicate  the  existence  of  Smith's  field  as  a  place  near 
their  home,  where  they  used  to  play,  in  Barking,  Essex  ;  and  the 
killing  of  the  cat  by  another  brother  was  also  recollected ;  while 
of  the  swimming  of  the  creek,  near  a  mill-race,  full  details  were 
given,  Frank  and  Jerry  being  the  heroes  of  that  foolhardy  episode. 

"  Some  of  the  other  facts  given  I  have  not  been  able  to  get 
verified.  Perhaps  there  are  as  many  unverified  as  verified.  And 
some  things  appear,  so  far  as  I  can  make  out,  to  be  false.  One 
little  thing  I  could  verify  myself,  and  it  is  good,  inasmuch  as  no 
one  is  likely  to  have  had  any  recollection,  even  if  they  had  any 
knowledge,  of  it.  Phinuit  told  me  to  take  the  watch  out  of  its 
case  (it  was  the  old-fashioned  turnip  variety),  and  examine  it 
in  good  light  afterwards,  and  I  should  see  some  nicks  near  the 
handle,  which  Jerry  said  he  had  cut  into  it  with  his  knife. 

"  Some  faint  nicks  are  there.  I  had  never  had  the  watch  out 
of  the  case  before,  being,  indeed,  careful  neither  to  finger  it 
myself  nor  to  let  any  one  else  finger  it. 

"  I  never  let  Mrs.  Piper  in  her  waking  state  see  the  watch  till 
quite  towards  the  end  of  the  time,  when  I  purposely  left  it  lying 


I 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  467 

on  my  desk  while  she  came  out  of  the  trance.  Before  long  she 
noticed  it,  with  natural  curiosity,  evidently  becoming  conscious 
of  its  existence  for  the  first  time." 

The  Sittings  of  Dr.  Leaf. 

On  the  occasion  of  this  visit  to  England,  several  sittings 
were  given  under  the  supervision  of  Dr.  Walter  Leaf. 
At  these  experiments  similar  precautions  were  taken,  a 
full  description  of  which  are  given  in  Dr.  Leafs  report. 
While  some  of  the  communications  that  were  obtained 
evidenced  a  knowledge  of  personal  matters  that  were 
certainly  foreign  to  Mrs.  Piper's  conscious  intelligence, 
all  tests  are  here  excluded,  with  the  exception  of  those 
that  indicate  the  appearance  of  a  separate  individuality. 
As  none  of  these  experiences  were  so  convincing  as  those 
that  contributed  to  the  success  of  Sir  Oliver  Lodge's 
sittings,  it  will  be  unnecessary  to  describe  them  with  so 
much  attention  to  detail. 

On  one  occasion,  when  Dr.  Leaf  and  a  Mr.  Clarke  had 
withdraw^n  from  the  room,  leaving  Mrs.  Piper  with  Mrs. 
Clarke,  Phinuit  mentioned  that  a  cousin  of  Mrs.  Clarke 
was  present.     He  then  continued  : — 

" '  There  was  something  the  matter  with  his  heart  and  with  his 
head.  He  says  it  was  an  accident.  He  wants  me  to  tell  you 
it  was  an  accident.  He  wants  you  to  tell  his  sisters.  There's 
M.  and  E.,  they  are  sisters  of  E.  And  there  is  their  mother. 
She  suffers  here  (pointing  to  abdomen).  E.  told  me.  His 
mother  has  been  very  unhappy  about  his  death.  He  begs  you 
for  God's  sake  to  tell  them  that  it  was  an  accident — that  it  was 
his  head — that  he  was  hurt  there  (making  motion  of  stabbing 
heart) ;  that  he  had  inherited  it  from  his  father.  His  father 
was  off  his  mind — you  know  what  I  mean — crazy.  But  the 
others  are  all  right  and  will  be.'  " 

In  a  note  that  follows  Mrs.  Clarke  says : — 
"  A  striking  account  of  my  uncle's  family  in  Germany.     The 


468  DEATH 

name  and  facts  are  all  correct.  The  father  was  disturbed  in  his 
mind  for  the  last  three  years  of  his  life  in  consequence  of  a  fall 
from  his  horse.  The  son  committed  suicide  in  a  fit  of  melan- 
cholia, by  stabbing  his  heart,  as  described.  .  .  .  The  most 
important  events — my  uncle's  .  .  .  death  and  my  cousin's 
suicide  .  .  .  were  known  to  only  two  persons  in  England 
besides  my  husband." 

The  most  interesting,  if  not  the  most  important 
communication,  occmTed  at  another  sitting. 

"*  Here's  M.,'  exclaimed  Phinuit,  'not  the  M.  who  hurt  her 
ankle,  but — another.  She  is  your  aunt.  .  .  .  She  is  in  the 
spirit.  .  .  .  She  is  here  and  wants  to  speak  to  you.'  '  What 
does  she  say  about  her  husband  ? '  Mrs.  Clarke  asked.  '  She 
says  he  has  changed  his  life  since.  She  does  not  like  it  that  he 
married  again  .  .  .  she  does  not  like  him  to  have  married  again 
so  soon.  He  married  her  sister.  Two  brothers  married  sisters. 
Her  husband  has  children  now.  There  are  two  boys.  And 
there  are  Max  and  Richard,  or  Dick,  as  they  call  him  ;  they 
are  with  your  uncle's  children.  Now  what  do  you  think  of 
this  ?  Don't  you  think  I  can  tell  you  many  things  ?  You  just 
ask  me  anything  you  like  and  I'll  tell  you.  .  .  .  Shall  I  tell 
you  how  you  ran  away  (chuckling)  with  that  man — that  boy,  I 
mean.  You  were  a  little  devil  to  do  that.  It  worried  your 
mother  almost  to  death.'  " 

In  her  notes  Mrs.  Clarke  explains  these  disclosures : — 

"  This  is  an  accurate  description  of  the  family  of  another 
uncle.  His  wife  died  childless,  and  he  soon  after  married  her 
sister,  by  whom  he  had  children.  His  brother  had  previously 
married  a  third  sister. 

"  When  five  years  old  I  rambled  off  with  two  boys,  staying 
hours  away  from  home,  an  event  which  in  my  family  is  jestingly 
referred  to  as  my  running  away." 

At  a  sitting  at  which  Mr.  F.  W.  H.  Myers  was  present, 
Phinuit  said,  speaking  to  Mr.  Myers : — 

"  *  Timothy  is  the  nearest  spirit  you  have  got  to  you  ;  some  call 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  469 

him  Tim ;  he  is  your  father.  Timothy  was  your  grandfather 
also.  Your  father  tells  me  about  S.  W. — stay,  I  can't  get  that 
— I  must  wait.  Your  mother  had  trouble  in  the  stomach  ;  she 
is  in  the  spirit  world.  Your  father  had  trouble  in  heart  and 
head.'     Myers'  father  passed  away  from  disease  of  the  heart." 

It  is  stated  in  an  explanatory  note  that,  "  except  the 
allusion  to  '  S.  W.,'  which  is  not  recognisable,  the  above 
is  all  true,  if  the  '  trouble  in  heart  and  head '  be  taken  to 
refer  to  Mr.  Myers'  father,  as  seemed  to  be  intended." 

Mr.  Myers  then  asked  Phinuit  if  he  could  tell  what  his 
father  did  in  his  earth- existence,  and  what  now  interested 
him.     Phinuit  replied  : — 

"  '  He  is  interested  in  the  Bible — a  clergyman.  He  used  to 
preach.  He  has  a  Bible  with  him ;  he  goes  on  reading  and 
advancing.  He  is  living  with  your  mother  just  the  same  as  on 
earth.  He  has  been  in  the  spirit-world  longer  than  she  has. 
Your  mother  is  a  little  nervous.  I  can't  get  her  to  come  near. 
Your  father  has  a  graceful,  solemn  manner,  as  he  had  on  earth. 
He  had  trouble  with  his  throat — irritation  (points  to  bronchial 
tubes).     The  boys  used  to  call  him  Tim  at  college.'  " 

It  is  stated  that  all  statements  that  could  be  verified 
were  found  to  be  correct.  Some  confusion  was  exhibited 
regarding  a  picture  of  Mr.  Myers'  father  "  in  the  hall,"  for 
while  it  was  admitted  that  it  was  not  a  photograph, 
Phinuit  seemed  somewhat  unable  to  determine  whether 
it  was  a  crayon  or  an  oil  painting.  It  was  finally  stated 
that  the  father's  dress  was  more  like  the  ecclesiastical 
garb  which  he  wore  in  an  oil  painting  hanging  in  Mrs.  A.'s 
sister's  house,  a  fact  which  could  not  have  been  known  to 
Mrs.  Piper. 

Professor  William  James,  in  a  long  letter  printed  at 
the  end  of  this  report,  stated  that : — 

*'  Taking  everything  I  know  of  Mrs.  P.  into  account,  the  result 
is  to  make  me  feel  as  absolutely  certain  as  I  am  of  any  personal 
fact  in  the  world  that  she  knows  things  in  her  trances  which 


470  DEATH 

she  cannot  possibly  have  heard  in  her  waking  state,  and  that 
the  definite  philosophy  of  her  trances  is  yet  to  be  found." 

D7\  Hodgsons  First  Report. 

In  Dr.  Hodgson's  first  report  there  are  many  items  of 
interest  that  should  be  recorded,  chiefly  occurring  in  con- 
nection with  the  control, — Dr.  Phinuit.  The  following 
is  a  typical  example  of  the  evidence  obtained  in  those 
days,  before  the  character  of  the  control  changed,  the 
Imperator  group  assumed  control,  and  the  automatic 
writing  developed : — 

"  January  5th,  1888,  I  was  told,  '  Here  is  somebody  who  says 
he  is  your  grandfather.  He  is  tall,  wears  glasses,  and  is  smooth 
shaven.'  ('Which  grandfather?')  'He  gives  his  name  F.' 
('Yes,  it  must  be  my  grandfather  F.,  if  smooth  shaven.')  'Well, 
it  is.  But  do  you  mean  that  your  grandfather  E.  wears  a 
beard  ? '  ('  Yes.')  '  I  think  you  must  be  mistaken.'  ('  No, 
I  am  sure  that  he  did.')  '  I  never  see  him  so,  and  I  see  him 
often.'  (My  grandfather  E.  died  before  my  birth,  but  I  had  been 
sure  that  he  had  been  described  to  me  as  full-bearded,  like  his 
son.  But  my  father,  when  appealed  to,  disappointed  me.  '  No, 
you  are  wrong,'  he  said.  '  I  am  like  him  in  figure  and  features, 
but  not  in  cut  of  beard.     He  was  always  smooth  shaven.' " 

There  were  three  prophecies  recorded,  one  from  a 
deceased  friend,  giving  her  name,  and  saying  that 
another  friend  of  Miss  W.'s,  giving  his  name,  would 
marry  soon.  The  "  communicator  "  was  the  deceased 
wife  of  the  person  named,  her  surviving  husband.  Miss 
W.  exclaimed  that  it  was  preposterous,  and  would  not 
believe  that  it  was  her  friend  who  was  communicating. 
But  the  prediction  was  insisted  on,  and  Miss  W.  had 
finally  to  admit  that  the  communications  were  charac- 
teristic of  her  friend,  but  attached  no  importance  to  the 
prediction.  But  the  prophesied  marriage  occurred  in  a 
few  months. 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  471 

The  last  prediction  is  very  interesting,  and  should  be 
quoted  in  full.     Miss  W.  says : — 

"In  the  spring  of  1888,  an  acquaintance,  S.,  was  sufFeiing 
torturing  disease.  There  was  no  hope  of  relief,  and  only 
distant  prospect  of  release.  A  consultation  of  physicians 
predicted  continued  physical  suffering,  and  probably  mental 
decay,  continuing  perhaps  through  a  series  of  years.  S.'s 
daughter,  worn  with  anxiety  and  care,  was  in  danger  of 
breaking  in  health.  '  How  can  I  get  her  away  for  a  little 
rest?'  I  asked  Dr.  Phinuit,  May  24,  1888.  'She  will  not 
leave  her  father,'  was  the  reply,  'but  his  suffering  is  not  for 
long.  The  doctors  are  wrong  about  that.  There  will  be  a 
change  soon,  and  he  will  pass  out  of  the  body  before  the 
summer  is  over.'     His  death  occurred  in  June  1888." 

From  time  to  time  various  tests  have  been  made  by 
the  aid  of  sealed  letters.  An  individual  has  written  a 
letter,  sealed  it,  and  sent  it  to  the  Society,  where  it 
remains  until  the  death  of  that  person.  During  the 
life  of  the  writer  of  the  letter  no  other  living  conscious- 
ness is  in  possession  of  its  contents,  we  may  suppose ; 
and  after  the  death  of  that  person,  and  until  the  letter 
was  opened,  no  living  consciousness  at  all  was  in 
possession  of  its  contents.  Now,  if  the  writer  of  such  a 
letter  purported  to  communicate,  and,  by  means  of  auto- 
matic writing,  gave  the  contents  of  such  letter,  it  would 
be  good  evidence  of  the  presence  and  identity  of  that 
person.  At  all  events,  in  order  to  offset  the  spiritistic 
interpretation  of  the  facts,  we  should  have  to  assume, 
among  other  things,  that  the  contents  of  the  letter 
were  passed  on  telepathically  to  other  living  minds 
during  the  lifetime  of  the  writer  of  the  letter;  and, 
after  the  death  of  the  writer,  this  knowledge  Avas 
obtained  from  their  minds  by  Mrs.  Piper,  through 
some  telepathic  process  unknown  to  us — for  any  of 
which    assumptions    there  is    not   the    slightest   particle 


472  DEATH 

of  evidence,  experimental  or  otherwise.  At  all  events, 
several  such  letters  have  been  written,  and  a  few  of 
them  tested,  while  a  number  yet  remain  in  the  offices  of 
the  Society,  awaiting  the  death  of  the  writer.  Most  of  the 
cases  so  far  tested  have  been  practical  failures,  but  there 
is  some  reason  for  this,  even  assuming  the  spiritistic  hypo- 
thesis to  be  true.  Many  persons  might  write  a  letter 
containing  what  seemed  to  them  important  material  at  the 
time,  but  might  totally  forget  its  contents.  To  give  an 
incident  of  this  character.  About  eight  years  ago,  a 
sister-in-law  of  a  friend  of  ours  wrote  a  letter  of  this 
nature,  and  gave  it  to  us  to  take  to  a  medium,  to  see  if 
she  could  tell  its  contents  without  breaking  the  seal  of 
the  envelope  in  which  it  was  enclosed.  It  concerned  an 
incident  which  at  that  time  seemed  very  important  to 
her,  and  one  that  she  could  never  forget !  At  the 
present  day,  however,  she  has  not  only  forgotten  the 
contents  of  the  letter,  but  has  totally  forgotten  the  fact 
that  she  ever  wrote  one  !  Were  she  to  die,  therefore, 
and  were  we  to  ask  her  about  this  letter,  she  would 
be  not  only  unable  to  tell  its  contents,  but  would 
deny  having  written  any  such  letter  at  all !  Doubtless 
it  is  the  same  in  other  cases.  The  contents  of  the 
letter  would  naturally  be  forgotten;  and  when  we  take 
into  account,  in  addition  to  this,  the  tremendous  diffi- 
culties experienced  while  communicating,  it  would  seem 
quite  natural  to  expect  very  little  conclusive  evidence — 
even  were  the  spiritistic  hypothesis  true. 

There  is  one  incident,  however,  which  is  quite 
striking,  and  which  certainly  deserves  mention  in  this 
place.  The  incident  is  thus  summarised  by  Dr.  Hj^slop 
in  his  Science  and  the  Future  Life,  pp.  189—91  : — 

**Miss  Hannah  Wild  and  her  sister,  Mrs.  Blodgett,  had 
frequently  talked  over  the  possibility  of  spirit  return,  and 
the   former   promised  to  write    a    letter,   whose   contents  she 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  473 

would  reveal  after  death,  if  any  such  thing  as  communication 
with  the  dead  were  possible.  It  was  some  time,  however, 
before  she  was  persuaded  to  write  the  letter.  One  day, 
about  a  week  before  she  died,  she  said,  '  Bring  me  pen  and 
paper.  If  spirit-return  is  true,  the  world  should  know.  I 
will  write  the  letter.'  She  wrote  the  letter,  and  enclosed  it 
in  a  tin  box,  and  when  she  handed  it  to  her  sister,  she  said, 
'  If  I  can  come  back  it  will  be  like  ringing  the  city  hall 
bell.'  She  spoke  about  the  letter  often.  Miss  Hannah  Wild 
died  July  28,  1886.  Towards  the  latter  part  of  the  same 
year,  Mrs.  Blodgett  saw  in  a  paper  a  notice  of  the  Society 
for  Psychical  Research,  in  which  the  name  of  Professor 
James  was  mentioned,  and  it  led  to  correspondence,  and  her 
telling  him  what  she  had  for  a  test.  Professor  James  pro- 
posed trying  Mrs.  Piper,  and  the  letter  was  sent  to  him 
properly  sealed.  Some  articles  that  had  been  worn  by  Miss 
Wild  were  sent  to  Professor  James,  and  by  him  to  Mr.  J. 
M.  Piper,  where  Mrs.  Piper  was  living  at  the  time,  and  the 
nature  of  the  test  explained  without  giving  any  names.  The 
letter  remained  in  the  possession  of  Professor  James. 

"  At  this  first  experiment,  Mrs.  Blodgett  not  being  present 
and  her  name  not  being  known,  Phinuit  obtained  the  name 
of  Hannah  Wild,  and  perhaps  some  perception  of  her  con- 
nection with  the  Woman's  Journal,  in  which  she  was  interested, 
and  to  whose  pages  she  had  contributed ;  also  the  name  of  her 
sister,  Bessie  (Mrs.  Blodgett),  to  whom  she  was  to  give  the 
test,  and  some  impression  to  the  then  recent  marriage  of  her 
sister.  Beyond  these  facts  practically  nothing  correct  was 
obtained.  Mrs.  Piper  had  numerous  sittings  for  the  purpose 
of  getting  the  details  of  what  Phinuit  gave  as  the  death-bed 
letter,  and  he  was  confident  that  he  had  been  conversing  with 
the  spirit  of  Hannah  Wild ;  yet  the  description  of  her 
personal  appearance  was  almost  entirely  wrong.  Phinuit's 
letter  contained  no  hint  of  the  substance  of  the  real  letter 
which  Mrs.  Blodgett  had  forwarded  to  Professor  James  for 
comparison  with  Phinuit's  statements,  and  the  numerous  cir- 
cumstances referred  to  in  Phinuit's  letter  had  scarcely  any 
relation  to  the  life  of  Hannah   Wild,       They   were  chiefly   a 


474  DEATH 

tissue  of  incorrect  statements.  The  result  so  far  suggested 
that,  however  Phinuit  succeeded  in  obtaining  the  names  and 
other  impressions  which  proved  to  be  more  or  less  correct, 
he  at  least  did  not  get  them  from  the  'spirit'  of  Hannah 
Wild. 

"The  next  experiment  was  made  with  both  Mrs.  Blodgett 
and  Dr.  Hodgson  present,  Dr.  Hodgson  taking  notes.  The 
sitting  had  been  arranged  before,  and  no  names  were  men 
tioned,  so  that  Mrs.  Piper  apparently  had  no  normal  knowledge 
of  the  relation  of  the  sitter  to  the  letter  whose  contents  it  was 
desirable  to  obtain.     At  the  first  shot  came  the  following  : — 

"  '  You  have  a  sister  here,  and  did  you  ever  find  out  about  that 
letter  ?  Anna.  Hannah.  Hannah  Wild.  She  calls  you  Bessie 
Blodgett.  You  were  in  an  audience,  and  a  message  was 
thrown  to  you.  She'll  tell  you  all  about  that.  How's  the 
Society — the  women,  you  know  ?  Moses.  He's  in  the  body. 
I  want  to  tell  you  about  that  letter.' 

"  The  pertinence  of  some  of  the  incidents  will  here  be  apparent 
without  comment.  The  name  Moses  seems  not  to  have  been  re- 
cognisable by  Mrs.  Blodgett.  She  had  been  at  Lake  Pleasant, 
where  a  '  medium,'  John  Slater,  had  said,  pointing  to  Mrs.  Blod- 
gett in  a  large  audience,  '  Lady  here  who  wants  to  have  you 
know  she  is  here.  Henry,  the  lame  man,  is  with  her.  She  wants 
to  know  about  the  big  silk  handkerchief.  Says  she  will  tell 
you  what  is  in  that  paper  very  soon.'  The  name  Henry  was 
also  alluded  to  here,  at  this  sitting  with  Mrs.  Piper,  and  Mrs. 
Blodgett  says,  '  This  Henry  was  my  mother's  only  male 
cousin,  and  she  had  lived  with  him  all  her  life  till  she  was 
married.     He  was  lame.' 

'*  A  little  later  in  this  sitting  with  Mrs  Piper  came  the 
question  purporting  to  come  from  Hannah  Wild.  '  Do  you 
remember  I  told  you  it  would  be  like  ringing  church  bells?' 
With  the  substitution  of  '  church  bells '  for  '  city  hall  bell,* 
the  reader  will  recall  this  was  the  statement  made  by  Hannah 
Wild  living,  when  she  handed  the  letter  in  the  box  to 
her  sister;  but  when  asked  just  after  this  allusion  to  tell 
the  contents  of  the  letter,  the  reply  was  irrelevant.  Five 
attempts    to    obtain    the    contents    of    the    letter  were    entire 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  475 

failures,  though  in  the  process  of  the  experiments  a  large 
number  of  true  incidents  were  given  through  Mrs.  Piper, 
such  as  those  here  indicated.  But  most  of  them,  at  least, 
were  known  to  Mrs.  Blodgett,  and  little  was  given  that  she 
did  not  know,  while  other  living  persons  knew  what  was 
unknown  to  her.^ 

Dr.  Hodgson  s  Second  Report. 

Coming  to  Dr.  Hodgson's  second  report,  we  find  a 
tremendous  mass  of  evidence  presented  which  we  can 
but  summarise  briefly.  The  following  passages  will 
give  the  reader  an  idea  of  the  nature  of  the  evidence, 
as  well  as  its  complications.  Theoretical  explanations 
we  reserve  until  later  : — 

G.  P.  :  Don't  you  want  me  to  give, — please  give  me  mother's 
letter.  (Mrs.  Howard  had  received  a  letter  from  Mrs.  Pelham, 
which  was  then  given  to  the  hand.)    Oh,  I  see  father  is  not  well. 

Mrs.  Howard  :  She  says  that  in  the  letter. 

G.  P.  :  I  am  sorry,  but  it  cannot  be  helped.  Where  is  it  she 
says  in  that  letter  she  is  going  ? 

Mrs.  Howard  :  First  to  New  York,  and  then  perhaps  to  come 
here,  George,  to  see  you. 

G.  P.  :  Oh,  I  am  sorry  I  asked  you  now  (crumpling  letter  in 
hand) ;  going  to  dispose  of  it  all  right ;  then  it  will  be  far  better. 

Mrs.  Howard  :  Let  us  see  that  word  again,  George. 

G.  P.  :  For  father,  since  he  is  so  delicate. 

Mrs,  Howard  :  Now  what  is  the  place  they  are  going  to  dis- 
pose of, — what  does  it  say  in  the  letter,  George  ?  Tell  me  the 
name. 

G.  P. :  The  house  and 

Mrs.  Howard  :  I  can't  read  that.  Write  it  again.  The  house 
and  what? 


^  This  resembles  another  case  very  closely,  in  which  the  communicator 
stated  certain  facts — none  of  which  were  true.  It  was  afterwards 
ascertained,  however,  that  the  patient  had  made  precisely  these  same 
statements  in  the  delirium  of  death  ;  see  p.  510. 


476  DEATH 

G.  P. :  The  property  in 


Mrs.  Howard  :  Wait  a  minute.     Have  another  sheet. 

G.  P. :  N.Y. 

Mrs.  Howard  :  What  is  the  name  of  the  place,  George  ?  If 
you  remember  the  name  write  it  down. 

G.  P.  :  (Scrawl.) 

R.  H.  :  Can't  read  that,  George. 

Mrs.  Howard  :  Never  mind,  George.  Take  the  letter  and  read 
it,  and  then  write  it  down.     Wait  a  second  ;  be  patient. 

G.  P.  :  (Crumpling  letter.)     (Scrawl.) 

R.  H.  :  Take  your  time,  George ;  capital  letters,  George ; 
capital  letters. 

G.  P.  :  I  do  wish  Hodgson  would  be  more  patient. 

R.  H. :  I  think  I  am  patient,  George.  I  am  telling  you  to 
be  patient. 

G.  P.  :  He  exasperates  me. 

R.  H. :  All  right,  George.  I  will  keep  entirely  silent  if 
you  like. 

G.  P.  :  In  the  extreme.     Fire  away,  Mary.     Go. 

Mrs.  Howard  :  Now,  George,  I  want  you,  if  you  remember  the 
name  of  that  place  in  New  York,  that  country  place  that  is 
going  to  be  disposed  of — I  want  to  know  the  name  of  it.  Yes, 
here  is  the  letter,  and  if  you  can  give  me  the  name,  write  it 
down. 

G.  P. :  Well,  why  do  you  confuse  me  so  1  Why  don't  you  let 
me  go  on  and  tell  you  what  she  says  ? 

Mrs.  Howard  :  Yes. 

G.  P. :  Without  interrupting  me  so  often  (crumpling  letter 
again).     Why  don't  you  answer? 

Mrs.  Howard  :  George,  you  know  there  is  a  question  she 
wants  me  to  ask  you  in  that  letter. 

G.  P. :   Potomac. 

Mrs.  Howard  :  Yes,  it  is  on  the  Potomac.  That  is  all  right. 
(Some  confusion  here.  The  town  Z.,  which  had  been  mentioned 
by  G.  P.  in  a  previous  sitting,  and  which  was  the  place  referred 
to,  was  on  the  Hudson,  and  this  was  well  known  to  Mrs. 
Howard.  Washington,  where  his  father  lived  in  the  winter,  is 
on  the  Potomac. — R.  H.) 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  477 

G.  P.  :  What  is  it,  Hodgson  ? 

R.  H.  :  Nothing,  George,  nothing.     I  am  listening. 

G.  P. :  Why  don't  you  say  your  say  ? 

R.  H.  :  I  have  said  my  say.    Now  I  am  letting  Mrs.  Howard. 

Mrs.  Howard  :  George,  I  want  to  ask  you  a  question.  Just  read 
what  she  says  there,  something  about  what  she  has  been  doing. 

G.  P. :  I  prefer  you  (Hodgson)  to  ask,  for  evidential  purposes, 
for  she  knows. 

Mrs.  Howard  :  Yes,  I  do. 

R.  H.  :  Well,  but  she  knows  what  questions  to  ask,  George, 
and  I  don't.  It  is  all  right  if  she  asks  ;  never  mind  if  she  does 
know. 

G.  P. :  Those  ...  oh,  all  right. 

R.  H.  :  Now  Mrs.  Howard  will  ask. 

Mrs.  Howard  :  I  want  to  know,  George,  what  you  have  seen 
your  mother  doing. 

G.  P.  :  I  simply  see  the  letter  and  tell  you  for  test. 

R.  H. :  Well,  George,  I  am  going  to  look  at  this  letter  again, 
and  ask  a  test  that  nobody  knows  here  at  all.  She  says  that 
you  perhaps  saw  her. 

G.  P. :  Please  look,  but  I  tell  you  all  I  can  any  way  whether 
you  ask  or  not. 

R.  H.  :  Yes ;  well,  there  is  a  question,  George,  if  you  will  wait 
just  a  minute,  I  want  to  ask,  because  your  mother  asks  it. 

G.  P.  :  She  has  asked  me  what  she  has  been  doing. 

Mrs.  Howard  :  Yes,  that  is  true. 

G.  P. :  Well,  she  has  been  shaking  up  my  things  a  little — I 
mean  my  clothes ;  it  is  a  simple  thing,  but  it  will  go  for  a  test. 
(I  believe  that  this  was  ascertained  by  Mrs.  Howard  to  be 
correct,  but  she  has  not  filled  up  the  spaces  for  her  notes  to 
this  sitting.— R.  H.,  1896.) 

R.  H.  :  First  rate^  George ;  we  will  find  out  from  her  about 
this. 

(He  is  told  that  Marte  is  coming  the  next  time,  and  requested 
to  find  out  the  name  of  Marte's  father  in  the  spirit.  Some 
remarks  about  Marte,  and  the  difference  between  him  and  Y.  Z.) 

G.  P.  :  .   .   .  Ask  me  anything  you  like. 


478  DEATH 

Mrs.  Howard  :  Well,  he  said  at  the  last  sitting  that  he  had 
something  for  Orenberg. 

G.  P.  :  Well,  it  was  this  he  wrote  you,  Jim,  about  me. 

Mrs.  Howard  :  Yes. 

G.  P.  :  And  wanted  to  know  what  I  had  to  say.  (Orenberg 
had  written  for  information  about  the  sittings. — J.) 

Mrs.  Howard  :  Go  on  ;  yes. 

G.  P. :  Well. 

Mrs.  Howard  :  If  we  had  gotten  that  before  the  letter,  it 
would  have  been  interesting. 

G.  P.  :  All  I  want  is  to  convince  him  that  there  is  a  real 
existence  after  the  liberation  of  the  spirit  from  the 

Mrs.  Howard  :  Wait  a  minute  ;  I  can't  see. 

G.  P. :  Material  organism. 

R.  H.  :  Material  organism. 

Good,  Hodgson ;  if  you  can  read  this  you  do  mighty 

Well,  I  think  you  are  doing  mightier  well  to  write  it, 

Well,  I  wish  you  knew  how  many  .   .  . 
R.  H.  Write  that  word  over  again.     Difficult  ? 

Oh  no,  .  .   .  stumbling  blocks  there  are,  Hodgson. 
Well,  perhaps  I  shall  know  them  some  day,  George, 
when  I  come  to  try  it  myself. 

G.  P.  :  Yes ;  then  you  will  be  glad  to  congratulate  me  for 
what  I  have  done. 

Dr.  Hodgson  says  in  speaking  of  this : — 

"  It  is  only  by  more  or  less  prolonged  conversations  that 
glimpses  into  personalty  may  be  obtained  in  inquiries  of  this 
sort,  and  the  evidence  in  relation  to  G.  P.'s  identity  rests  not  a 
little  upon  the  characteristics  of  his  mental  make-up,  including 
not  only  his  intellectual,  but  his  emotional  qualities,  his  affec- 
tions, his  weaknesses,  his  sympathies  and  antipathies,  and  his 
loyalties.  In  the  badgering  (this  is  really  the  nearest  term  to 
suggest  the  actual  fact)  to  which  I  had  subjected  him  in  the 
persistence  of  the  inquiry  which  I  made  in  connection  with 
Y.  Z.'s  question,  I  had  touched    unwittingly  the  very  core  of 


G. 

P. 

well. 

R. 

H. 

Geor 

ge- 

G. 

P. 

R. 

H. 

G. 

P. 

R. 

H. 

THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  479 

that  loyalty  to  his  friends  which  was  highly  characteristic  of 
the  living  G.  P.,  and  which  apparently  led  (by  my  association) 
Y.  Z.  to  the  manifestation  against  myself  of  a  certain  amount 
of  annoyance — followed,  be  it  noted,  by  a  desire  to  remove  the 
dissatisfaction  produced  in  me  by  his  remarks." 

Again,  a  graphic  and  most  interesting  passage  is  that 
given  on  pp.  321-22  : — 

"  It  was  during  this  sitting  that  perhaps  the  most  dramatic 
incident  of  the  whole  series  occurred.  Mrs.  Howard  was  sup- 
porting Mrs.  Piper's  head,  I  was  following  the  writing,  and 
Mr.  Howard  was  sitting  some  distance  away  smoking  a  long 
pipe,  when  the  following  conversation  occurred  : — 

G.  P.  :  Now  what  will  I  do  for  you  ? 

R.  H. :  Well,  George,  is  there  anything  that  you  would  like 
to  give  us — any  special  message  that  you  thought,  it  would  be 
desirable  for  us  to  have,  or  anything  about  philosophy?  we 
should  be  glad  to  have  that ! 

Mr.  Howard  :  Well,  George,  before  you  go  to  philosophy — you 
know  my  opinion  of  philosophy — 

G.  P.  :  It  is  rather  crude,  to  be  sure. 

Mr.  Howard :    Tell   me    something ;    you    must   be   able    to 
recall  certain  things  that  you  and  I  know.     Now,  it  makes  no 
difference  what  the  thing  is  ;  tell  me  something  that  you  and  I 
alone  know.     I  ask  you  because  several  things  I  have  asked 
you  have  failed  to  get  hold  of. 

G.  P.  :  Why  did  you  not  ask  me  this  before  ? 

Mr.  Howard :  Because  I  did  not  have  occasion  to. 

G.  P.  :  What  do  you  mean,  Jim  1 

Mr.  Howard  :  I  mean,  tell  me  something  that  you  and  I 
alone  know — something  in  our  past  that  you  and  I  alone  know. 

G.  P.  :  Do  you  doubt  me,  dear  old  fellow  ? 

Mr.  Howard :  I  simply  want  something — you  have  failed  to 
answer  certain  questions  that  I  have  asked.  Now,  I  want  you 
to  give  me  the  equivalent  of  the  answers  to  those  questions  in 
your  own  terms. 

G.  P.  :  What  were  they  1 

Mr.  Howard  :  The  questions  were  about  where  we  dined — 


480  DEATH 

and  that  you  did  not  remember.  Now  tell  me  something  you 
do  remember. 

G.  P.  :  Oh,  you  mean  now. 

Mr.  Howard  :  Tell  me  something  now  that  you  remember 
that  had  happened  before. 

G.  P. :  Well,  I  will.  About  Arthur  ought  to  be  a  test.  How 
absurd.  .  .  .  What  does  Jim  mean  ?  Do  you  mean  our  conver- 
sations on  different  things,  or  do  you  mean  something  else  ? 

Mr.  Howard:  I  mean  anything.  Now,  George,  listen  for  a 
moment ;  listen,  listen. 

G.  P.  :  I  know. 

Mr.  Howard  :  I  mean  that  we  spent  a  great  many  summers 
and  winters  together,  and  talked  on  a  great  many  things,  and 
had  a  great  many  views  in  common,  went  through  a  great  many 
experiences  together.  Now  (G.  P.  commencing  to  write),  hold 
on  a  minute. 

G.  P. :  You  used  to  talk  to  me  about  .  .  . 

The  transcription  here  of  the  words  written  by  G.  P.  conveys, 
of  course,  no  proper  impression  of  the  actual  circumstances ;  the 
inert  mass  of  the  upper  part  of  Mrs.  Piper's  body  turned  away 
from  the  right  arm,  and  sagging  down,  as  it  were,  limp  and 
lifeless  over  Mr.  Howard's  shoulder ;  but  the  right  arm,  and 
especially  hand,  mobile,  intelligent,  deprecatory,  then  impatient 
and  fierce  in  the  persistence  of  the  writing  which  followed,  con- 
tains too  much  of  the  personal  element  in  G.  P.'s  life  to  be 
reproduced  here.  Several  statements  were  read  by  me  and 
assented  to  by  Mr.  Howard,  and  then  was  written  '  private/ 
and  the  hand  gently  pushed  me  away.  I  retired  to  the  other 
side  of  the  room,  and  Mr.  Howard  took  my  place  close  to  the 
hand,  where  he  could  read  the  writing.  He  did  not,  of  course, 
read  it  aloud,  and  it  was  too  private  for  my  perusal.  The  hand, 
as  it  reached  the  end  of  each  sheet,  tore  it  off  from  the  block 
book,  and  thrust  it  wildly  at  Mr.  Howard,  and  then  continued 
writing.  The  circumstance  narrated,  Mr.  Howard  informed  me, 
contained  precisely  the  kind  of  a  test  for  which  he  had  asked ; 
and  he  said  that  he  was  '  perfectly  satisfied,  perfectly.'  After 
this  incident  there  was  some  further  conversation  with  reference 
to  the  past  that  seemed  especially  natural,  coming  from  G.  P." 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  481 

Bt.  Hysl(yps  First  Report. 

We  come  next  to  Dr.  Hyslop's  series  of  sittings,  the 
account  of  which  occupies  650  pages,  or  the  entire  six- 
teenth volume  of  the  Proceedings.  We  can,  of  course, 
refer  to  but  one  or  two  incidents  here.  An  interesting 
passage  is  the  following : — 

"On  February  5,  1900,  after  a  spontaneous  reference  to  my 
Aunt  Eliza  and  some  pertinent  conversation  about  her,  my 
father  said  again  spontaneously  :  '  What  I  would  now  ask  is,  that 
Eliza  should  recall  the  drive  home  and — let  me  see  a  moment — 
I  am  not  sure  but  it  was  one  of  the  shafts ;  but  the  wagon  broke, 
some  part  of  it,  and  we  tied  it  with  a  cord.  I  remember  this 
very  well.'  Inquiry  showed  the  incident  false  in  relation  to  my 
aunt  mentioned  in  the  message.  She  said  that  no  such  incident 
had  ever  occurred  in  their  lives. 

*'  My  uncle  did  not  try  to  communicate  personally  after  this 
date  until  June  2,  1902.  I  then  asked  him  if  he  remembered 
what  we  did  just  after  father  passed  out,  and  the  reply  came, 
'  You  are  thinking  of  that  ride ;  I  guess  I  do  not  forget  it.' 
But  he  became  too  confused  to  continue,  and  the  next  day  when 
he  appeared  I  put  the  question  about  the  ride  just  after  father 
passed  out.  After  saying,  '  Your  father  told  you  before,  but  had 
it  on  his  mind,  Eliza,'  he  referred  immediately  to  a  ride  that  we 
had  taken  to  father's  grave  to  see  a  gravestone  that  I  had  ordered 
placed  there.  This  was  correct,  but  was  not  the  incident  I  had 
in  mind.  From  my  attitude  on  one  of  the  incidents  men- 
tioned in  this  connection,  he  apparently  came  to  the  conclusion 
that  we  were  not  thinking  of  the  same  things,  and  said  :  '  I 
think  we  are  thinking  of  different  things.  Let  me  think.  You 
don't  mean  the  Sunday  afternoon,  do  you?'  I  replied  that 
I  did.  Immediately  he  mentioned  that  we  had  a  breakdown ; 
that  we  broke  the  shaft ;  that  we  mended  it  with  a  piece  of 
harness ;  that  the  horse  was  a  red  one ;  that  we  got  home  late 
in  the  evening  ;  and  that  it  was  a  dog  that  frightened  the  horse. 
There  were  a  number  of  slight  errors  in  the  messages.  The  thing 
that  frightened  the  horse  was  a  negro  boy  with  a  goat  and  wagon. 

"  The  facts  [were   these : — My   father  died  on   Saturday   at 

2h 


482  DEATH 

my  uncle's  home.  The  next  morning,  Sunday,  a  telegram 
arrived,  which  we  had  to  deliver  at  once,  and  we  hastened  to 
deliver  it  in  the  country  with  a  buggy  and  hoise.  On  the  road- 
side we  met  a  negro  boy  with  a  goat  and  wagon,  which  fright- 
ened the  horse,  and  it  shied,  overturning  the  buggy,  dragging  it 
over  us,  and  injuring  both  of  us  rather  badly  ;  broke  the  shaft, 
which  we  had  to  mend  with  a  string  or  a  piece  of  harness ;  and 
we  arrived  home  late  in  the  evening,  having  promised  each 
other  that  we  would  say  nothing  about  it,  so  that  it  would  not 
*  leak  out,'  so  to  speak.  But  we  were  so  badly  hurt  that  we 
could  not  conceal  it  longer  than  the  next  morning." 

The  following  incident,  summarised  in  Science  and 
a  Future  Life  (Putnam's  Sons),  pp.  227-8,  certainly 
deserves  mention.     Dr.  Hyslop  writes : — 

*'  My  uncle,  James  McClellan,  in  his  '  Communications,'  just 
after  giving  the  name  of  my  father  as  '  John  James  McClellan,' 
it  being  only  John  McClellan,  said,  '  I  want  to  tell  you  about  his 
going  to  the  war,  and  about  one  of  his  fingers  being  gone  before 
he  came  here.' 

"  Inquiry  showed  that  John  McClellan,  the  father  of  James 
McClellan,  my  uncle,  had  not  been  in  any  war,  and  had  not  lost 
a  finger  before  he  died.  But  I  found  that  a  John  McClellan, 
no  relative  of  mine  but  probably  a  distant  relative  of  my  uncle 
from  another  bi^anch  of  the  McClellans,  and  who  lived  in  the 
same  county,  was  mentioned  in  the  history  of  that  county  as 
having  been  commissioned  as  an  ensign  in  the  war  of  1812. 
Earlier  in  the  sittings  in  connection  with  the  name  John  and 
associated  with  the  name  of  Robert  McLellan,  who  was  a  com- 
municator, was  the  name  Hathaway,  and  three  of  the  Williams 
family.  I  had  great  difficulty  in  running  down  the  incidents. 
But  I  found  finally  that  this  John  McClellan,  who  had  been  an 
ensign  in  the  war  of  1812,  had  lost  a  finger  there;  that  he  had 
died  some  years  before  I  was  born,  and  that  Hathaway  was  the 
name  of  his  son-in-law's  cousin ;  and  this  son-in-law's  son 
remembers  that  the  Williamses  had  been  mentioned  in  connec- 
tion with  John  McClellan,  who  had  lost  a  finger.  He  was 
known  prior  to  his  death  as  '  Uncle  John  McClellan.'     In  the 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  483 

earlier  references  to  the  name  John  there  was  one  by  my  father 
in  which  he  was  once  called  '  Uncle  John,'  and  then  a  mention 
of  the  university  where  my  father  had  sent  me,  and  where  I 
had  known  the  John  McClellan  who  was  my  uncle's  brother, 
but  who  was  neither  mine  nor  my  father's  uncle.  The  old 
'  Uncle  John  McClellan  '  had  lived  near  my  mother's  birthplace, 
and  might  have  been  known  to  her  in  her  early  days." 

Experiments  since  Dr.  Hodgson  s  Death. 

The  following  account  of  the  experiments  made  by 
Dr.  Hyslop  with  Mrs.  Piper,  and  other  mediums,  since 
the  death  of  Dr.  Richard  Hodgson,  has  been  condensed 
from  the  official  reports  as  published  in  the  Journal  of 
the  American  Society  for  Psychical  Research,  in  the  issues 
of  February,  March,  and  April  1907.  As  abridged,  Dr. 
Hyslop's  narrative  is  as  follows : — 

"  In  accordance  with  a  previous  promise,  I  summarise  here 
some  results  of  experiments  since  the  death  of  Dr.  Richard 
Hodgson.  They  of  course  implicate  Mrs.  Piper,  but  I  do  not 
mean  to  confine  the  phenomena  to  what  has  occurred  through 
her.  The  reason  for  this  is  apparent.  The  scientific  sceptic 
would  not  easily  be  convinced  by  any  alleged  messages  from 
Dr.  Hodgson  through  that  source.  It  is  not  that  any  suspicion 
of  Mrs.  Piper's  honesty  is  to  be  entertained  at  this  late  day, 
as  the  past  elimination  of  even  the  possibility  of  fraud  as  well 
as  the  assurance  that  she  has  not  been  disposed  to  commit  it, 
are  sufficient  to  justify  ignoring  it.  But  a  far  more  compli- 
cated objection  arises,  and  this  is  the  unconscious  reproduction 
of  knowledge  acquired  in  a  perfectly  legitimate  way.  Dr. 
Hodgson  had  been  so  long  associated  with  Mrs.  Piper  that 
we  cannot  know,  without  having  his  own  ante-mortem  statement, 
what  he  may  casually  have  told  her  about  himself  and  his  life. 

"  One  incident  of  great  importance  occurred  in  my  first 
sitting  after  Dr.  Hodgson's  death.  After  he  had  referred  to 
some  discussions  which  he  and  I  had  over  my  Report  on  the 
Piper  case  in  the  spring  of  1900,  and  had  made  some  refer- 
ence to  his  posthumous  letter,  he  suddenly  broke  out  with  the 


484  DEATH 

statement :  '  Remember  that  I  told  Myers  we  would  talk 
nigger  talk.'  1  saw  at  a  glance,  owing  to  my  familiarity  with 
phenomena  of  this  kind,  that  something  was  wrong,  and  I  said, 
speaking  to  Mrs.  Piper's  hand,  as  we  always  do  :  '  No,  you 
must  have  told  that  to  some  one  else.'  The  reply  from  Hodgson 
was  :  '  Ah,  yes,  James.  I  remember  it  was  Will  James.  He 
will  understand.  Do  you  remember  the  difficulties  we  had  in 
regard  to  our  hypothesis  on  the  spiritistic  theory?'  I  knew 
nothing  of  this,  and  wrote  to  Professor  James,  who  was  in  Cali- 
fornia at  the  time,  to  ascertain  whether  any  such  remark  had 
ever  been  made  to  him  by  Dr.  Hodgson,  The  statement  was 
pertinent,  as  I  knew  that  Dr.  Hodgson  and  I  had  talked  with 
Professor  James  on  the  mental  conditions  of  communicators, 
but  I  did  not  know  whether  any  such  definite  incident  had 
occurred  between  them.  Professor  James  replied  that  he  did 
not  recall  any  incident  of  the  kind.  When  he  returned  to 
Cambridge  late  in  the  spring,  the  incident  was  told  him  again 
by  his  son,  and  Professor  James  again  denied  all  recollection  of 
the  matter.  At  lunch  with  Mr.  Piddington  the  same  day  he 
was  telling  his  guest  what  his  opinion  was  of  the  trance 
personalities  in  the  Piper  case.  Professor  James  did  not  believe 
them  to  be  spirits,  but  secondary  personalities  of  Mrs,  Piper, 
suggested  by  her  knowledge  of  the  same  personalities  in  the 
case  of  Stainton  Moses  and  the  development  of  Dr.  Hodgson's 
influence  during  his  experiments.  In  the  process  of  thus 
explaining  his  opinion  he  said  to  Mr,  Piddington  that  he  had 
several  times  told  Dr.  Hodgson  that,  if  he  would  only  use  a 
little  tact,  he  could  convert  their  deific  verbiage  into  nigger 
minstrel  talk,  and  then  he  suddenly  recalled  what  had  been 
said  in  the  communications  and  wrote  me  the  facts." 

"  On  another  occasion  Dr.  Hodgson  remarked,  through  Mrs. 
Piper : — '  Remember  one  thing,  and  keep  this  on  your  mind. 
I  shall  avoid  referring  to  things  of  which  you  are  thinking  at 
the  time  as  much  as  possible  and  refer  to  my  own  memories. 
I  have  seen  too  much  not  to  understand  my  business.'  It  is 
interesting  to  remark  the  allusion  to  not  telling  me  what  I  was 
thinking  of  at  the  time.  I  doubt  if  any  other  communicator 
than    Dr.   Hodgson  would   think   of   this    point.      He   was  so 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  485 

familiar  with  the  objection  to  the  spiritistic  hypothesis  from 
telepathy  that  he  was  always  on  the  look-out  for  the  facts  that 
told  against  this  objection,  and  here  it  turns  up  as  a  habit  of 
thought  which  few  would  manifest. 

"There  were  a  number  of  allusions  to  Dr.  Hodgson  in  the 
automatic  writing  of  Mrs.  Smead  before  she  knew  of  bis 
death,  which  had  been  carefully  concealed  from  her  by  Mr. 
Smead,  and  one  or  two  apparitions  of  him  associated  with  a 
frequent  apparition  of  myself.  At  one  sitting  the  name  of 
my  father  was  associated  with  that  of  Dr.  Hodgson. 

"  I  come  now  to  a  set  of  incidents  which  are  perhaps  as 
important  as  any  one  could  wish.  I  had  an  arrangement  for 
three  sittings  beginning  March  19th  (1906).  Previous  to 
this  I  arranged  to  have  a  sitting  with  a  lady  whom  I  knew 
well  in  New  York  City.  She  was  not  a  professional  psychic, 
but  a  lady  occupying  an  important  position  in  one  of  the  large 
corporations  in  this  city.  This  sitting  was  on  the  night  of 
March  16th,  Friday.  At  this  sitting  Dr.  Hodgson  purported 
to  be  present.  His  name  was  written,  and  some  pertinent 
things  said  with  reference  to  myself,  though  they  were  not  in 
any  respect  evidential.  Nor  could  I  attach  evidential  value 
to  the  giving  of  his  name,  as  the  lady  knew  well  that  he  had 
died.  I  put  away  my  record  of  the  facts,  and  said  nothing 
about  the  result  to  any  one.  I  went  on  to  Boston  to  have 
my  sittings  with  Mrs.  Piper. 

"  Soon  after  the  beginning  of  the  sitting  Eector,  the  trance 
personality  usually  controlling,  wrote  that  he  had  seen  me  '  at 
another  light,'  that  he  had  brought  Hodgson  there,  but  that 
they  could  not  make  themselves  clear,  and  asked  me  if  I  had 
understood  them.  I  asked  when  it  was,  and  received  the 
reply  that  it  was  two  days  before  Sabbath.  The  reader  will 
see  that  this  coincides  with  the  time  of  the  sitting  in  New 
York.  Some  statements  were  then  made  by  Kector  about 
the  difficulty  of  communicating  there,  owing  to  the  '  inter- 
vention of  the  mind  of  the  light,'  a  fact  coinciding  with  my 
knowledge  of  the  case,  and  it  was  stated  that  they  had  tried  to 
send  through  a  certain  word,  which  in  fact  I  did  not  get. 

"When   Dr.    Hodgson   came  a    few    minutes  afterwards    to 


486  DEATH 

communicate,  he  at  once  asked  me,  after  the  usual  form  of  his 
greeting,  if  I  had  received  his  message,  and  on  my  reply  that 
I  was  not  certain,  he  asked  me  to  try  the  lady  some  day  again. 
As  soon  as  the  sitting  was  over,  1  wrote  to  the  lady  without 
saying  a  word  of  what  had  happened,  and  arranged  for  another 
sitting  with  her  for  Saturday  evening  the  24th. 

*'  At  this  sitting  one  of  the  trance  personalities  of  the  Piper 
case,  one  who  does  not  often  appear  there,  appeared  at  this 
sitting  with  ]N[iss  X.,  as  I  shall  call  her,  and  wrote  his  name, 
if  that  form  of  expression  be  allowed.  Miss  X.  had  heard  of 
this  personality,  but  knew  that  Kector  was  the  usual  amanu- 
ensis in  the  Piper  case.  Immediately  following  the  trance 
personality  whose  name  was  written,  Dr.  Hodgson  purported 
to  communicate  and  used  almost  the  identical  phrases  with 
which  he  begins  his  communications  in  the  Piper  case — in 
fact,  several  words  were  identical,  and  they  are  not  the  usual 
introduction  of  other  communicators.  After  receiving  this 
message  I  wrote  to  Mr.  Henry  James,  Jr.,  without  saying 
what  I  had  gotten,  and  asked  him  to  interrogate  Dr.  Hodgson 
when  he  got  a  sitting  to  know  if  he  had  recently  been  com- 
municating with  me,  and  if  he  answered  in  the  affirmative,  to 
ask  Dr.  Hodgson  what  he  had  told  me.  About  three  weeks 
after,  Mr.  James  had  his  sitting,  and  carried  out  my  request. 
Dr.  Hodgson  replied  that  he  had  been  trying  to  communicate 
with  me  several  Sabbaths  previously,  and  stated  with  some 
approximation  to  it  the  message  which  I  had  received  on  the 
evening  of  the  24th. 

"  The  reader  will  perceive  that  these  incidents  involve  cross- 
references  with  another  psychic  than  Mrs.  Piper,  and  though 
I  am  familiar  with  the  methods  by  which  professional  mediums 
communicate  with  each  other  about  certain  persons  who  can  be 
made  victims  of  their  craft,  it  must  be  remembered  that  we  are 
not  dealing  with  a  professional  medium  in  Miss  X.,  and  that 
we  cannot  call  Mrs.  Piper  this  in  the  ordinary  use  of  the  term. 
I  can  vouch  for  the  trustworthiness  of  Miss  X.,  and  think  that 
the  ordinary  explanation  of  the  coincidences  will  not  apply  in 
this  instance. 

"The  next  day  after  the  sitting  just  mentioned,  when  Dr. 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  487 

Hodgson  came  to  communicate,  he  asked  me  if  I  remembered 
anything  about  the  cheese  we  had  at  a  lunch  in  his  room. 
At  first  I  thought  of  an  incident  not  connected  with  a  lunch,  but 
with  an  attempt  at  intercommunication  between  two  mediums, 
in  which  a  reference  to  cheese  coming  from  Dr.  Hodgson  was 
made ;  but  as  soon  as  the  mention  of  a  lunch  was  made  which 
had  no  relevance  to  what  I  was  thinking  of,  I  recalled  the 
interesting  circumstance  that  once,  and  only  once,  I  had  had 
a  midnight  lunch  with  Dr.  Hodgson  at  the  Tavern  Club,  when 
he  made  a  Welsh  rarebit  and  we  had  a  delightful  time. 

"Another  incident  is  still  more  important  as  representing 
a  fact  which  I  did  not  know  and  which  was  relevant  to  a 
mutual  friend  who  was  named  and  who  knew  the  fact.  At 
this  same  sitting  Dr.  Hodgson  sent  his  love  to  Prof.  Newbold, 
of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania,  and  told  me  to  ask  him  if 
he  remembered  being  with  him  near  the  ocean  on  the  beach. 
I  inquired  of  Prof.  Newbold  if  this  had  any  pertinence  to  him, 
and  he  replied  that  the  last  time  he  saw  Dr.  Hodgson  was  in  the 
previous  July  at  the  ocean  beach." 

On  the  occasion  of  one  of  Dr.  Hy slop's  sittings  with  Mr. 
Quentin,  a  psychic  whose  work  is  doubtless  familiar  to  readers 
of  the  current  literature  upon  this  subject,  another  opportunity 
to  test  the  cross-references  presented  itself.  "I  had  previously 
made  arrangements  to  have  an  experiment  with  another  psychic 
in  Boston,"  says  Prof.  Hyslop,  "  and  as  soon  as  I  got  the  chance 
I  indicated  it,  and  the  following  is  the  record.  I  was  at  the 
sitting  with  Mrs.  Piper. 

"  *  (Now,  Hodgson,  I  expect  to  try  another  case  this  afternoon.)' 

"  '  S  M  I T  H,'     [Pseudonym.] 

'''(Yes,  that's  right.)' 

"  '  I  shall  be  there,  and  I  will  refer  to  Books  and  give  my 
initials  R.  H.  only  as  a  test.' 

'"(Good.)' 

"  'And  I  will  say  books.^ 

"  I  was  alone  at  the  sitting  with  Mrs.  Piper.  She  was  in  a 
trance,  from  which  she  recovers  without  any  memory  of  what 
happens  or  has  been  said  during  it.  Three  hours  afterward 
I  went  to    Mrs.  Smith,  who    did   not  know  that    I  had    been 


488  DEATH 

experimenting  that  day  with  Mrs.  Piper.  After  some  general 
communications  by  the  control,  and  a  reference  to  some  one 
who  was  said  to  be  interested  in  Dr.  Hodgson,  came  the 
following.  In  this  case  it  was  not  by  automatic  writing  as 
with  Mrs.  Piper,  but  by  ordinary  speech  during  what  is  ap- 
parently a  light  trance. 

"  *  Beside  him  is  Dr.  Hodgson.  It  is  part  of  a  promise  to 
come  to  you  to-day  as  he  had  just  been  to  say  to  you  he  was 
trying  not  to  be  intense,  but  he  is  intense.  I  said  I  would 
come  here.  I  am.  I  thought  I  might  be  able  to  tell  different 
things  I  already  told.  Perhaps  I  can  call  up  some  past  in- 
terviews and  make  things  more  clear.  Several  things  were 
scattered  around  at  different  places.  [I  have  several  purported 
communications  from  him  through  four  other  cases.]  He  says 
he  is  glad  you  came,  and  to  make  the  trial  soon  after  the  other.' 

"  [I  put  a  pair  of  Dr.  Hodgson's  gloves  which  I  had  with 
me  in  Mrs.  Smith's  hands.] 

" '  You  know  I  don't  think  he  wanted  them  to  help  him  so 
much  as  he  wanted  to  know  that  you  had  them.  You  have 
got  something  of  his.  It  looks  like  a  book,  like  a  note  book, 
with  a  little  writing  in  it.     That  is  only  to  let  you  know  it.' 

"  At  this  point  the  subject  was  spontaneously  changed,  and 
I  permitted  things  to  take  their  own  course.  A  little  later 
he  returned  to  the  matter,  and  the  following  occurred  : — 

"'There  is  something  he  said  he  would  do.  He  said:  "I 
would  say  like  a  word."  I  said  I  would  say — I  know  it's  a 
word  [last  evidently  the  psychic's  mind.]  Your  name  isn't 
it  1  [apparently  said  by  psychic's  mind  to  the  communicator.]  I 
said   I   would    say : — Each  time   the   word    slips.     [Pause.]     I 

am  afraid  I    can't  get  it.     It    sounds Looks  as  if    it   had 

about  seven  or  eight  letters.  It  is  all  shaky  and  wriggly,  so 
that  I  can't  see  it  yet.' 

"  '  Can't  you  write  it  down  for  him  so  I  can  see  1 '  [appar- 
ently said  to  the  communicator,]  C. :  [psychic  shakes  her 
head.]  [Pause.]  Psychic's  fingers  then  write  on  the  table.] 
*  Would  it  mean  anything  like  "  Comrade  "  ? '  ('  No.')  He  goes 
away  again.  ('  All  right.  Don't  worry.')  [Pause.]  '  Let  me 
take  your  other  hand.'     [Said  to  me.     1  placed  my  left  hand 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  489 

in  the  psychic's.]  No  good.  [Pause.]  '  I'm  trying  to  do  it. 
I  know  that  he  has  just  come  from  the  other  place,  and  kept 
his  promise  to  say  a  word.' 

''The  reader  will  notice  that  I  got  the  reference  to  books, 
the  promise  to  say  a  word,  and  an  apparent  attempt  to  give 
the  other  promised  message,  which  was  not  successful.  It  is 
noticeable  that  the  word  '  initial '  has  seven  letters  in  it. 

"  The  message  is  not  so  clear  as  the  most  exacting  critic 
might  demand,  but  we  must  remember  that  we  are  not  deal- 
ing with  well  established  methods  of  communication  involving 
perfect  command  over  the  mental  and  cosmic  machinery  for  this 
purpose.  The  main  point  is  that  there  is  a  coincidence  of  per- 
sonality and  message  in  the  case  where  it  was  not  previously 
known  that  any  such  reference  to  books  would  be  relevant. 

"  I  should  add  in  this  connection  another  important  incident 
which  will  strengthen  the  coincidence  involved  in  the  facts  just 
told.  I  had  another  experiment  the  same  evening  with  another 
young  lady  who  is  not  a  professional,  and  with  whose  mother 
I  had  been  in  correspondence  for  some  time.  I  had  arranged 
some  time  before  to  have  a  sitting  for  that  evening.  I  did  not 
give  the  slightest  hint  that  I  was  to  be  in  Boston  for  any  other 
business,  and  no  one  of  the  family  was  informed  of  my  arrival 
two  days  previously  or  of  my  intentions  of  having  sittings  with 
Mrs.  Piper  and  Mrs.  Smith.  When  I  arranged  to  go  out  to  the 
house  with  the  mother,  I  made  it  appear  that  I  had  arrived  from 
New  York  only  a  half-hour  before.  Hence  it  was  not  known  to 
the  mother  or  to  the  young  lady  that  I  had  had  any  other 
experiments  that  day. 

"  At  the  experiment  with  Mrs.  Piper  I  had  used  a  pair  of  old 
gloves  which  Dr.  Hodgson  had  worn— the  same  being  used  for 
purposes  which  experimenters  in  this  field  understand — and 
I  had  placed  the  same  articles  in  the  hands  of  Mrs.  Smith  when 
I  got  the  reference  to  books.  When  I  had  my  experiment  with 
the  young  lady  mentioned  later  in  the  evening  of  the  same  day, 
it  was  some  time  before  I  placed  the  same  gloves  in  her  hands. 
When  I  did  she  paused  a  few  minutes,  made  a  general  remark, 
and  then  said :  '  I  get  books  in  connection  with  these.' 

"  The   coincidence   again   is   apparent,  and   whether   it   is   to 


490  DEATH 

have  any  causal  significance  will  depend  upon  the  judgment  of 
each  reader  who  is  capable  of  estimating  the  character  of  such 
phenomena. 

"  I  shall  pass  now  from  incidents  involving  '  cross-reference ' 
to  those  which  do  not,  and  confine  myself  to  what  came  through 
Mrs.  Piper  on  October  10th.  They  may  be  more  specific  than 
the  type  which  I  have  just  illustrated,  and  must  be  adjudged  by 
the  reader  according  to  his  tastes. 

"  After  the  description  of  the  incidents  connected  with  some 
Ouija  board  experiment,  Dr.  Hodgson,  through  the  automatic 
writing  of  Mrs.  Piper,  said  : — 

"  '  Do  you  remember  a  joke  we  had  about  George's  putting  his 
feet  on  the  chair  and  how  absurd  we  thought  it?' 

"('George  who?') 

"'  Pelham,  in  his  description  of  his  life  here.' 

*'  ('No,  you  must  have  told  that  to  some  one  else.') 

"  '  Oh,  perhaps  it  was  Billy.     Ask  him.' 

"  I  knew  what  '  Billy '  referred  to.  This  was  the  name  by 
which  he  had  always  called  Professor  Newbold,  and  so  I  made 
inquiry  of  him  regarding  the  pertinence  of  the  incident.  He 
replied  that  he  and  Dr.  Hodgson  had  laughed  heartily  at  some 
statements  of  George  Pelham,  when  he  was  trying  to  communi- 
cate after  his  death,  about  the  way  he  did  when  he  was  com- 
municating. He  claimed  that  he  was  in  the  medium's  head 
and  his  feet  on  the  table  while  he  was  trying  to  communicate 
through  her  hand.  The  description  is  ludicrous  enough,  but  the 
incident,  perhaps,  is  good  enough  to  prove  identity,  and  the  best 
part  of  its  value  is  that  I  did  not  know  the  facts. 

"  There  are  just  three  hypotheses  which  are  capable  of  dis- 
cussion in  connection  with  such  facts.  They  are  (1)  Fraud  ; 
(2)  Telepathy  ;  and  (3)  Spirits. 

"  Secondary  personality  would  not  be  presented  as  an  alterna- 
tive by  any  one  who  knows  what  that  phenomenon  is.  Secon- 
dary personality,  in  respect  of  the  contents  of  its  mental  action, 
claims  to  be  limited  to  the  normal  action  of  the  senses,  and  is 
distinguished  from  fraud  in  that  its  whole  character  is  uncon- 
scious, while  fraud  is  properly  conscious  deception  by  the  normal 
subject.    If  fraud  in  this  case  be  excluded  from  view,  there  can 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  491 

be  no  doubt  that  such  facts  as  have  been  enumerated  are  super- 
normal, whatever  the  specific  explanation.  But  secondary  per- 
sonality never  assumes  the  supernormal  acquisition  of  knowledge. 
It  is  limited  to  what  has  been  obtained  in  a  normal  manner  by 
the  subject.  Hence  it  is  excluded  from  view  by  virtue  of  that 
fact.  As  to  fraud,  that  has  been  excluded  from  consideration  in 
the  Piper  case  for  fifteen  or  twenty  years,  and  only  unintelligent 
men  would  talk  about  it  any  longer. 

"  I  should  be  ashamed,  as  one  who  has  tried  to  be  scientific, 
to  advance  telepathy  as  an  explanation  of  any  such  facts.  Any 
man  who  knows  what  he  means  by  the  use  of  this  term  would 
not  venture  to  suppose  it  an  explanation.  Really  scientific  men, 
who  know  what  they  are  talking  about,  would  not,  in  the  light  of 
the  evidence,  have  the  temerity  to  propose  it  as  an  adequate 
theory  of  phenomena  involving  such  a  system  of  '  cross  refer- 
ences '  illustrative  of  the  personal  identity  of  deceased  persons 
and  nothing  else.  I  do  not  think  the  hypothesis  worthy  of 
serious  defence.  It  is  an  hypothesis  worthy  only  of  intellectual 
prudes.  I  should  much  prefer  fraud  as  an  explanation ;  for  we 
have  analogies  and  experiences  enough  to  make  that  intelligible  ; 
but  for  the  kind  of  telepathy  necessary  to  cover  such  facts  we 
have  no  adequate  scientific  evidence  whatever. 

"As  to  the  third  hypothesis,  namely,  that  of  spirits,  I  shall 
not  undertake  any  dogmatic  defence.  It  is  obvious  to  me  that 
it  is  the  most  rational  hypothesis  after  eliminating  fraud  from 
such  matters,  and  my  own  stand  in  various  publications  would 
indicate  what  position  I  would  preferably  assume." 

Mr.  Piddingtons  Bepoi^t. 

One  of  the  latest  reports  of  the  trance  phenomena 
of  Mrs.  Piper  is  that  by  Mr.  J.  G.  Piddington — issued 
as  volume  xxii.  of  the  Proceedings  of  the  Society  for  Psychi- 
cal Research.  It  contains  a  lengthy  account  of  a  series 
of  experiments  in  what  has  been  called  "  cross- corre- 
spondences," or  "  concordant  automatisms."  This  series 
is  very  important,  not  only  because  a  careful  record  was 


492  DEATH 

kept  of  the  proceedings — every  word  spoken,  &c. — but 
because  an  entirely  new  method  of  obtaining  evidential 
material  was  adopted  and  carried  into  execution.  This 
idea  was  really  that  of  the  controls  themselves,  who  seemed 
to  realise  full  well  the  difficulty  of  supplying  information 
to  the  sitters  which  could  not  in  some  way  be  explained, 
as  due  to  telepathy,  and  they  consequently  proposed  the 
following  method : — That  some  sentence  or  sign  should 
be  given  through  the  hand  of  one  medium,  and  that  this 
same  word,  or  sign,  or  sentence  should  be  given  through 
the  hand  of  another  medium,  as  soon  thereafter  as  pos- 
sible, at  some  distance  from  the  original  experiment. 
The  idea  was  to  prove  that  the  same  intelligence  was 
operative  in  the  two  places — a  third  and  independent 
intelligence  separate  from  that  of  either  medium. 
Further,  in  order  to  complicate  matters,  it  was  resolved 
that  these  cross-references  should  be  as  difficult  and  as 
roundabout  as  possible.  Instead  of  the  message  being 
clearly  given  in  both  cases,  that  is,  it  was  to  be  given 
in  an  evasive  form.  Thus,  if  one  medium  wrote,  "  To 
be  or  not  to  be,"  and  another  medium  wrote  "  Shake- 
speare," and  if  another  medium  were  to  write  ''  Hamlet," 
all  these  three  communications  would  obviously  refer 
to  the  same  thing,  and  originate  from  the  same  source — 
especially  if  the  intelligence  drew  attention  to  these 
words,  and  told  the  sitters  that  these  words  were  part 
of  the  cross-correspondences,  and  that  the  rest,  the  key, 
was  to  be  found  in  the  automatic  writings  of  some  other 
medium.  This  was  the  idea  proposed  by  the  intelli- 
gences, and  later  carried  into  operation  by  them.  It 
will  be  seen  that  the  idea  was  a  splendid  one,  inasmuch 
as  it  practically  shut  off  thought-transference  entirely ; 
for  not  one  of  the  mediums — even  had  she  known 
what  was  in  her  automatic  script — would  have  known 
what  the  key-word  was,  and   hence   could   not  possibly 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  493 

have  transferred  it  to  another  medium  by  thought- 
transference — any  more  than  she  could  have  communi- 
cated it  by  fraud,  granting  that  a  possible  hypothesis. 
Fortunately,  we  do  not  have  to  consider  this  seriously 
in  the  case,  since  all  the  automatists — with  the  exception 
of  Mrs.  Piper,  who  has  now  established  her  own  reputation 
— are  ladies  whose  social  standing  cannot  be  questioned. 
Let  us  briefly  examine  some  of  these  cross-references, 
then,  and  see  how  far  they  serve  to  prove  the  existence 
of  a  third,  independent  intelligence. 

On  16th  January  1907,  it  was  proposed  to  "Mr. 
Myers,"  communicating  through  Mrs.  Piper,  that  he 
should  visit  other  mediums,  and  give  through  their 
hands  some  clear  sign  of  his  identity — say,  a  triangle 
within  a  circle.  A  circle  with  a  triangle  within  it 
appeared  in  Mrs.  Verrall's  script  on  January  28,  at  the 
foot  of  a  remarkable  communication  embodying  a  suc- 
cessful cross-correspondence.  Mrs.  Holland's  script  also 
contained  undoubted  attempts  at  this  figure  on  May  8. 

Another  somewhat  striking  incident  is  the  following, 
which  we  sum  up  in  a  few  words : — 

"  On  February  4,  Mrs.  Yerrall  wrote  a  script  containing  Mrs. 
Sidgwick's  name,  the  word  *  library,'  and  Frederic  Myers'  initials  ; 
and  at  11.7  a.m.  on  February  6,  began  to  write  a  script  in  which 
the  word  '  library '  appeared  three  times ;  and  on  no  other 
occasion  during  the  period  under  review  did  the  word  '  library ' 
occur  again  in  her  script.  On  February  6,  between  11.32  and 
11.37  A.M.  (as  near  as  I  can  calculate),  MyerSj,  (Myers  communi- 
cating through  Mrs.  Piper)  ^  said  he  had  referred  to  a  '  library 
matter'  through  Mrs.  Verrall;  and  on  February  11,  that  he 
had  persistently  repeated  the  word  '  library '  to  Mrs.  Verrall, 
also  his  own  name  and  Mrs.  Sidgwick's ;  and,  to  the  best  of 
my  recollection  and  belief,  the  word  '  library '  was  not  mentioned 


^  Throughout  Myers p   =  Myers  communicating  through  Mrs.  Piper; 
Myers^  =  through  Mrs.  Verrall  ;  and  Myers  n  =  through  Mrs.  Holland. 


494  DEATH 

on  any  other  occasion  in  Mrs.  Piper's  trance  during  the  whole 
period  of  the  English  sittings  except  in  connection  with  this 
episode  "  (p.  57). 

On  January  23,  1907,  the  following  occurred  through 
the  hand  of  Mrs.  Verrall : — 

"  That  gives  the   words,  but  an  anagram  would   be    better. 
Tell  him  that — rats,  star,  tars,  and  so  on.       Try  this. 
It  has  been  tried  before,  RTATS  re-arrange  these 
five  letters,  or  again  tears 

stare 

seam 

same 

and  so  on.  ..." 

Now,  in  going  through  Dr.  Hodgson's  MSS.  after  his 
death,  Mr.  Piddington  discovered  several  papers  contain- 
ing the  words  star,  rats,  tars,  arts — and  adds  that  this 
seems  to  have  been  a  favourite  anagram  of  Dr.  Hodgson's. 
Here,  then,  we  have  a  soi-disant  Dr.  Hodgson  after 
death  waiting  the  very  words  he  was  so  fond  of  in  life, 
and  which  no  one  had  seen  until  after  his  death ! 

The  next  incident  is  summed  up  by  Mr.  Piddington 
as  follows : — 

"Mrs.  Verrall  draws  an  arrow  on  February  11.  Hodgson 
on  February  12  says  he  has  given  an  arrow  to  Mrs.  Verrall, 
and  on  February  17  Miss  Verrall  draws  an  arrow.  In  view 
of  these  coincidences  the  words  which  follow  the  drawing:  of 
the  three  arrows  in  Mrs.  Verrall's  script — 'tria  convergentia  in 
unum  ' — become  possessed  of  a  strange  pertinency  "  (p.  85). 

The  next  incident  is  of  less  evidential  value,  but 
we  quote  it,  as  one  of  the  present  writers  was  indirectly 
concerned  in  its  production.  On  February  19,  1907, 
Mr.  Piddington  suggested  to  the  Piper  controls  that 
the  words  "giant"  and  "dwarf"  be  given  through  Mrs. 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  495 

Verrall's  hand.  It  was  promised  that  a  trial  would 
be  made,  and  the  matter  was  referred  to  on  several 
subsequent  occasions,  the  controls  finally  stating  that 
they  had  succeeded  in  "  getting  '  dwarf '  through  " — that 
is,  that  Mrs.  Verrall  had  written  it.  A  careful  search 
of  the  script,  however,  failed  to  disclose  any  sign  of  the 
word,  and  the  experiment  was  set  down  as  a  complete 
failure.  When  one  of  us  (H.  Carrington),  however,  had 
sittings  with  Mrs.  Piper  in  January  1908,  Rector  again 
stated  that  he  had  given  ''dwarf"  through  Mrs.  Verrall's 
hand.  This  second  claim  caused  another  careful  search 
through  the  script,  and  it  was  then  found  that  "  little 
men "  had  been  given  through  Mrs.  Verrall's  writing 
on  February  20,  1907 — one  day  after  the  request 
was  made.  This  queer  roundabout  method  of  giving 
the  required  word  was  quite  typical  of  Mrs.  Verrall's 
automatic  writing. 

Again,  summing  up  another  remarkable  cross- corre- 
spondence experiment,  Mr.  Piddington  says  (p.  139): — 

"  In  this  concordant  episode  of  Mrs.  Piper's  trance  and  Mrs. 
Verrall's  script,  the  controlling  influence  in  both  cases  claims 
to  be  one  and  the  same  personality,  namely,  Frederic  Myers. 
Let  us,  however,  ignore  this  claim,  and  continue  to  use  the 
symbols  MyerSp  and  Myers^.  The  case  will  then  stand  thus  :  To 
MyerSp  a  question  is  put  which  could  have  been  answered  by 
Frederic  Myers.  MyerSp  gives  various  answers  to  it — all  intelli- 
gent, and  all  but  one  provably  correct.  Before  MyerSp  gives  his 
first  answer,  MyerSy  showed  knowledge  of  what  the  answer  of 
MyerSp  will  be.  Besides' this,  MyerSp  shows  that  he  knows  MyerSy 
had  previously  shown  knowledge  of  his  (MyerSp)  answer.  One 
of  the  facts  comprised  in  this  first  answer  cannot  be  proved 
to  have  been  known  to  Frederic  Myers,  but  there  are  good 
grounds  for  thinking  that  it  might  well  have  belonged  to  that 
body  of  specialised  and  characteristic  knowledge  with  which  his 
mind  was  stocked.  The  facts  involved  in  the  remainder  of 
the  answer  given  by  MyerSp  were  all  known  to  Frederic  Myers; 


496  DEATH 

and  they  emerged  in  a  manner  which  indicates  that  the  intelli- 
gence responsible  for  their  emergence  was  as  intimately  con- 
versant with  the  closing  chapters  of  Human  Personality  as 
Frederic  Myers,  its  author,  must  have  been." 

Indeed,  on  pp.  242-3  of  this  report,  Mr.  Piddington 
is  forced  to  say  : — 

"The  concatenation  or  mosaic  of  ideas  which  I  am  about 
to  describe,  I  regard  not  as  the  result  of  telepathic  cross-firing 
casually  exchanged  between  the  automatists,  but  as  the  work 
of  a  single  directing  intelligence,  or  of  a  group  of  intelligences 
acting  in  concert ;  and  I  consider  that  this  directing  intelligence 
manifested  itself  chiefly  in  the  communications  of  MyerSp,  MyerSy, 
and  Myersij.  Of  the  problem  of  the  real  identity  of  this  directing 
mind — whether  it  was  a  spirit  or  group  of  co-operating  spirits, 
or  the  subconsciousness  of  one  of  the  automatists,  or  the  con- 
sciousness or  subconsciousness  of  some  other  living  person — the 
only  opinion  which  I  hold  with  confidence  is  this :  that  if  it  was 
not  the  mind  of  Frederic  Myers,  it  was  one  which  deliberately 
and  artistically  imitated  his  mental  characteristics." 

The  report  closes  with  an  account  of  a  most  remark- 
able test,  which  we  must  summarise  very  briefly.  A  test 
question  was  put  to  MyerSp,  in  Latin,  and  Latin  so  diflS- 
cult  in  structure  that  no  one,  not  a  scholar,  would  be 
likely  to  ascertain  its  meaning,  even  with  the  aid  of  a 
dictionary.  Mrs.  Piper  knows  little  or  no  Latin.  If,  then, 
MyerSp  understood  its  purport,  it  would  be  good  evidence 
that  some  intelligence  other  than  that  of  Mrs.  Piper  was 
active — Myers  while  living,  of  course,  being  a  fine  Latin 
scholar. 

The  test  question,  or  rather  message,  given  to  the  trance 
personalities,  translated  into  English,  reads  as  follows : — 

"  We  are  aware  of  the  scheme  of  cross-correspondences  which 
you  are  transmitting  through  various  mediums ;  and  we  hope 
you  will  go  on  with  them. 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  497 

"  Try  also  to  give  A.  and  B.  two  different  messages,  between 
which  no  connection  is  discernible.  Then  as  soon  as  possible 
give  to  C.  a  third  message  which  will  reveal  the  hidden 
connection." 

It  is  obvious  that  this  must  have  been  first  of  all 
understood  (in  the  Latin  form)  by  the  communicating 
intelligence  before  it  could  have  been  acted  upon ;  then 
the  request  must  have  been  carried  out  as  suggested,  in 
order  to  insure  a  success. 

Roughly  speaking,  and  without  going  into  the  mass  of 
evidence  that  has  been  presented  in  this  case,  it  may  be 
said  that  MyerSp  seemed  to  have  obtained  a  fairly  com- 
plete grasp  of  the  contents  and  meaning  of  the  Latin 
message,  and  to  have  acted  upon  it.  Although  a  clear 
tri-statement  was  at  no  time  made,  the  report  seems  to 
indicate,  clearly  enough,  that  a  single  intelligence  was 
operative  in  all  three  cases,  and  that  it  not  only  under- 
stood the  question,  but  answered  it  as  best  it  could  in 
the  manner  suggested.  For  the  details  of  this  remark- 
able incident  we  must  refer  the  reader  to  the  report  itself. 

Later  Statements  hy  Professor   William  James  and 
Sir  Oliver  Lodge. 

In  June  1909,  appeared  Part  Iviii.  of  the  Proceedings 
of  the  Society  for  Psychical  Research,  containing  reports 
on  the  trance  phenomena  of  Mrs.  Piper  by  Professor 
William  James  and  Sir  Oliver  Lodge.  Space  does  not 
permit  our  quoting  from  these  records  in  any  detail. 
The  general  conclusions  of  the  writers  must  suffice.  The 
character  of  the  records  was  very  similar  to  those  which 
had  gone  before — the  "  controls  "  being  Richard  Hodgson, 
in  the  one  case,  and  a  group  of  intelligences  in  the  other, 
mostly  relatives  of  the  sitters.  In  his  report,  Professor 
James  comes  out  quite  squarely,  for   the  first  time,  in 

2  I 


498  DEATH 

favour     of    the    spiritualistic     hypothesis,     saying    (pp. 
120-1):— 

"  It  is  enough  to  indicate  these  various  possibiUties,  which  a 
serious  student  of  this  part  of  nature  has  to  weigh  together,  and 
between  which  his  decision  will  fall.  His  vote  will  always  be 
cast  (if  ever  it  be  cast)  by  the  sense  of  the  dramatic  probabiUties 
of  nature,  which  the  sum  total  of  his  experience  has  begotten  in 
him.  /  myself  feel  as  if  an  external  loill-to-communicate  tvere  pro- 
haUy  there;  that  is,  I  find  myself  doubting,  in  consequence  of 
my  whole  acquaintance  with  that  sphere  of  phenomena,  that 
Mrs.  Piper's  dream  life,  even  equipped  with  '  telepathic ' 
powers,  accounts  for  all  the  results  found.  But  if  asked  whether 
the  will-to-communicate  be  Hodgson's,  or  be  some  mere  spirit- 
counterfeit  of  Hodgson,  I  remain  uncertain  and  await  more 
facts — facts  which  may  not  point  clearly  to  a  conclusion  for  fifty 
or  a  hundred  years." 

Sir  Oliver  Lodge,  in  summing  up  his  report,  says : — 

*'0n  the  whole,  they  (the  messages)  tend  to  render  certain  the 
existence  of  some  outside  intelligence  or  control,  distinct  from 
the  consciousness,  and,  so  far  as  I  can  judge,  from  the  subcon- 
sciousness also,  or  Mrs.  Piper  or  other  mediums.  And  they  tend 
to  render  probable  the  working  hypothesis,  on  which  I  choose  to 
proceed,  that  that  version  of  the  nature  of  the  intelligences  which 
they  themselves  present  and  favour  is  something  like  the  truth. 
In  other  words,  I  feel  that  we  are  in  secondary  or  tertiary  touch 
— at  least  occasionally — with  some  stratum  of  the  surviving 
personality  of  the  individuals  who  are  represented  as  sending 
messages.  .  .  . 

"The  old  series  of  sittings  with  Mrs.  Piper  convinced  me  of 
survival,  for  reasons  which  I  should  find  it  hard  to  formulate  in 
any  strict  fashion,  but  that  was  their  distinct  effect.  They  also 
made  me  suspect — or  more  than  suspect — that  surviving  intelli- 
gences were  in  some  cases  consciously  communicating — yes,  in 
some  few  cases  consciously ;  though  more  usually  the  messages 
came  in  all  probability  from    an   unconscious   stratum,   being 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  499 

received  by  the  medium  in  an  inspirational  manner  analogous 
to  psychometry  "  (pp.  282,  284).i 


Dr.  Hyslo'ps  Second  Report. 

In  May  1910,  Dr.  Hyslop  published  his  second 
voluminous  report  on  the  mediumship  of  Mrs.  Piper,  in 
the  Proceedings  of  the  American  Society  for  Psychical 
Research.  It  would  be  impossible  for  us  to  summarise 
this  here,  as  the  facts  are  spread  over  some  800  pages. 
Detailed  reports  are  given  of  sittings  with  Mrs.  Piper, 
and  also  other  mediums — Mrs.  Keeler,  Miss  W.,  Mrs. 
Chenoworth,  &c. — some  of  which  sittings  offered  apparent 
cross-references  to  the  Piper  sittings  formerly  held,  and 
added  other  points  of  interest.  The  character  of  the 
facts  and  of  the  main  arguments  adduced  were  similar 
to  those  formerly  advanced ;  the  striking  and  original 
portion  of  the  report  being  the  lengthy  chapter  devoted 
to  the  "  Conditions  Affecting  Communication."  In  this 
chapter,  Dr.  Hyslop  had  discussed  in  a  scholarly  and 
original  way  many  of  the  physiological  and  psychological 
problems  that  surround  the  process  of  "  communicating  " 
— granting,  for  the  sake  of  argument,  that  such  com- 
munication takes  place.  The  record  must  be  read  in 
the  original  to  be  appreciated  or  thoroughly  understood. 

It  will  be  seen  that  the  superficial  appearance,  at  all 
events,  of  these  phenomena,  is  that  the  spirit  of  the 
departed  person  is  actually  communicating  at  the  time, 
with  more  or  less  difficulty,  in  a  more  or  less  fragmentary 
manner.  The  difficulties  in  the  way  of  communicating 
must  be  great  indeed,  and  the  wonder  is,  not  that  we  j 
receive  so  little,  but  that  we  receive  any  messages  what-  \ 
ever.     As  Mr.  Andrew  Lang  so  wittily  remarked,  "  The 

^  Further  details  of  this  series  of  sittings  may  be  found  in  the  Proceed- 
ings of  the  Society  for  Psychical  Research,  vol.  xxiv.,  part  Ix. 


500  DEATH 

miracle  of  Balaam's  ass  was  not  that  it  said  anything  in 
particular,  but  that  it  said  anything  at  all ! "  It  is  the 
same  here.  The  difficulties  experienced  by  all  com- 
municators must  be  immense ;  and  for  this  reason  doubt- 
less, so  little  clear  and  consecutive  information  is  given. 
As  we  have  indicated  our  own  views  of  these  difficulties 
in  another  place,  however,  we  will  not  dwell  upon  them 
here. 

In  a  work  of  this  sort  it  is,  of  course,  impossible  to 
attempt  any  direct  i^roof  of  survival  —  the  data  we 
have  presented  above  will  merely  give  the  reader  an 
idea  of  the  nature  and  character  of  the  evidence,  and 
especially  of  the  means  whereby  such  evidence  is  obtained. 
We  desire  only  to  indicate  that  by  such  methods,  and  by 
such  methods  only,  will  any  direct  proof  of  the  immortality 
of  the  soul  be  obtained.  The  results  may  as  yet  be  incon- 
clusive— the  method  of  ohtaining  th&m  is  the  important  factor 
to  insist  upon.  While,  to  many  minds,  the  evidence  so 
far  published  is  insufficient  to  warrant  a  belief  in  the 
existence  of  ''  spirits,"  it  is  at  least  sufficiently  strong  to 
show  us  that  there  is  here  a  case  for  investigation ;  one, 
moreover,  that  presents  great  possibilities ;  and  which,  if 
the  conclusions  be  established,  would  definitely  defeat 
materialism.     (See  Appendix  H.) 

7.  Other  Trance  Mediums. 

The  Case  of  Mrs.  Smead. 

It  must  not  be  supposed  that,  because  we  have  devoted 
so  much  space  to  the  Piper  case,  that  it  is  the  mily  one 
of  the  kind  that  we  have  any  record  of.  On  the  con- 
trary, there  are  many  cases  of  the  same  character;  but 
in  them  the  phenomena  are  not  so  clear  and  well  defined, 
and  the  cases  have  not  been  under  scientific  observa- 
tion for  so  long;  and  for  these  reasons  the  phenomena 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  501 

cannot  be  given  the  same  weight  as  in  the  better-attested 
case.  But,  if  only  to  show  the  similarity  in  the  type  of 
the  phenomena,  we  quote  here  one  or  two  incidents, 
coming  through  other  mediums,  which  will  serve  to 
indicate  that  the  same  general  character  of  phenomena 
appears  in  all. 

Thus,  in  the  case  of  Mrs.  Smead,  the  following  incident 
occurred.  The  sitting  was  held  on  the  anniversary  of 
the  sitter's  wedding-day — a  fact  certainly  unknown  to 
the  medium,  or  to  any  one  but  the  sitter  herself.  Yet 
her  husband  appeared  at  the  sitting  and  apparently  com- 
municated as  follows : — 

"....'  Yes,  you  know  we  used  to  talk  about  it  [pause]  and 
[pause]  happier  on  [pencil  ran  off  sheet].  So  it  should  be  only 
to  you  to-day,  my  love.  I  do  not  want  to  talk  to  any  one  else. 
We  went  alone  that  day  and  on  the  cayes  [southern  pronunciation 
for  '  cars,'  often  spelled  '  cyahs,'  pause  and  apparent  excitement]. 
You  know  [pause]  your  mother  did  not  want  to  part  with  her 
daughter,  but  we  were  so  happy.  (•  Who  else  was  at  our 
wedding  ? ')  [Confusion  and  scrawls  in  which  apparent  attempts 
at  the  letter  '  o '  are  evident]  ouch  [common  expression  among 
the  negroes,  bat  was  a  specially  common  one  with  an  old  negro 
servant  of  the  family.     He  prepared  the  wedding  luncheon.] 

"  '  He  says.  Law  missie.  [Mrs,  B.  again  broke  down  sobbing.] 
Don't  cry  [pause] ;  it  is  no  time  for  weeping,  but  you  must  be  like 
as  that  other  day  [pause]  yes  [pause].  We  do  not  want  you  to 
weep.  ('Oh,  is  that  Amos?')  [excitement]  yes,  they  know 
[pause]  ,  ,  ,  [apparently  something  about  going.]  It  is  time,  this 
friend  says.  No,  I  will  kiss  my  sweatheart  [sweetheart]  and  go 
[pause]  I  would  talk  more  now,  but  I  must  go,  I  do  not  want 
to  go  .  ,  ,  go.  Keep  my  words  for  your  comfort ;  for  you  know 
my  love.  I  cannot  want  you  to  give  it  to  to  [?]  [erased  ap- 
parently] yes,  others,  my  words.  I  said  not  my  love,  C, 
[pause,  pencil  goes  back  and  begins  again,  superposing  on  C.] 
Capten.      [His  name  was  Captain  Benton,]  "  ^ 

1  Proceedings,  American  S.P.R.,  vol.  i.,  pp.  621-2. 


502  DEATH 

The  Case  of  Mrs.  Thompson. 

One  very  interesting  and  promising  case  of  trance 
phenomena,  which  the  Society  was  unable,  unfortmiately, 
to  follow  up,  was  that  of  Mrs.  Thompson,  reports  on 
whose  phenomena  were  published  in  vols.  xvii.  and  xix.  of 
the  Proceedings.  In  these  sittings  a  number  of  striking 
incidents  occurred,  among  many  not  so  remarkable.  In 
the  sittings  of  Dr.  van  Eeden,  for  example,  very  strong- 
proofs  of  identity  were  forthcoming.  In  his  report  to  the 
Society  he  says  : — 

"...  For  instance,  the  young  man  who  had  committed 
suicide  gave  as  proofs  of  his  identity  Dutch  names  and  places  which 
were  not  at  all  in  my  mind  at  the  moment.  This  might  have 
been  unconscious  telepathy.  At  the  same  time  proper  names  were 
given  which  I  had  never  heard  myself.  I  did  not  even  know 
such  names  existed.  Yet  later,  in  Holland,  I  came  across 
people  who  bore  these  very  names,  though  their  connection  (if 
any)  with  the  young  man  I  could  not  find  out.  .   .   . 

"  My  personal  impression  [of  the  value  of  the  evidence]  has 
varied  in  the  following  manner.  During  the  first  series  of  ex- 
periments, in  November  and  December  1899,  I  felt  a  very 
strong  conviction  that  the  person  whose  relics  I  had  brought 
with  me,  and  who  had  died  fifteen  years  ago,  was  living  as  a 
spirit  and  was  in  communication  with  me  through  Mrs.  Thomp- 
son. A  number  of  small  particulars,  which  will  be  found  in 
the  notes,  produced  on  me,  when  taken  en  hloc,  the  effect  of 
perfect  evidence.  To  regard  these  all  as  guesses  made  at  random 
seemed  absurd  :  to  explain  them  by  telepathy  forced  and  in- 
sufficient. 

"  But  when  I  came  home,  I  found  on  further  inquiry  inex- 
plicable faults  and  failures.  If  I  had  really  spoken  to  the  dead 
man,  he  would  never  have  made  these  mistakes.  And  the 
remarkable  feature  of  it  was  that  all  these  mistakes  were  in 
those  very  particulars  which  I  had  not  known  myself,  and  was 
unable  to  correct  on  the  spot.  .  .   . 


THE  TESTIMONY  OF  SCIENCE  503 

"  Consequently,  my  opinion  changed.  There  were  the  facts, 
quite  as  certain  and  marvellous  as  before.  I  could  not  ascribe 
them  to  fraud  or  coincidence,  but  I  began  to  doubt  my  first  im- 
pression that  I  had  really  dealt  with  the  spirit  of  a  deceased 
person;  and  I  came  to  the  conclusion  that  I  had  dealt  only  with 
Mrs.  Thompson,  who,  possessing  an  unconscious  power  of  infor- 
mation quite  beyond  our  understanding,  had  acted  the  ghost, 
though  in  perfect  good  faith.   .   .  . 

"  But  on  my  second  visit,  in  June  1900,  when  I  took  with 
me  the  piece  of  clothing  of  the  young  man  who  had  committed 
suicide,  my  first  impression  came  back,  and  with  greater  force. 
I  was  well  on  my  guard,  and  if  I  gave  hints,  it  was  not  uncon- 
sciously, but  on  purpose ;  and,  as  will  be  seen  from  the  notes, 
the  plainest  hints  were  not  taken,  but  the  truth  came  out  in  the 
most  curious  and  unexpected  ways.  .  .  . 

"  Up  to  the  sitting  of  June  7th,  all  information  came  through 
Nellie,  Mrs.  Thompson's  so-called  spirit-control.  But  on  that 
date,  the  deceased  tried,  as  he  had  promised,  to  take  the  control 
himself,  as  the  technical  term  goes.  The  evidence  then  became 
very  striking.  During  a  few  minutes — though  a  few  minutes 
only — I  felt  absolutely  as  if  I  were  speaking  to  my  friend  him- 
self. I  spoke  Dutch  and  got  immediate  and  correct  answers. 
The  expression  of  satisfaction  and  gratification  in  face  and 
gesture,  when  we  seemed  to  understand  one  another,  was  too 
vivid  to  be  acted.  Quite  unexpected  Dutch  words  were  pro- 
nounced, details  were  given  which  were  far  from  my  mind,  some 
of  which,  as  that  about  my  father's  uncle  in  a  former  sitting,  I 
had  never  known,  and  found  to  be  true  only  on  inquiry  after- 
wards. ..." 

Mrs.  Thompson,  it  need  hardly  be  said,  is  entirely 
ignorant  of  the  Dutch  language.  Dr.  van  Eeden's  next 
remarks  are  very  interesting  and  important — enabling 
us  to  understand  much  of  the  difficulty  and  confusion 
that  exists,  in  cases  of  this  character.     He  says : — 

"  But  being  now  well  on  my  guard,  I  could,  exactly  in  this 
most  interesting   few   minutes,   detect,  as  it  were,   where   the 


504  DEATH 

failures  crept  in,  I  could  follow  the  process  and  perceive  when 
the  genuine  phenomena  stopped  and  unconscious  play-acting 
began.  In  hardly  perceptible  gradations  the  medium  takes 
upon  herself  the  role  of  the  spirit,  completes  the  information, 
gives  the  required  finish,  and  fills  in  the  gaps  by  emendation 
and  arrangement.  .   .  . 

**  We  see  how  recklessly  and  carelessly  the  spirit-control, 
Nellie,  enters  into  explanations  about  things  of  which  she 
evidently  understands  nothing,  though  she  referred  to  them 
spontaneously  herself.  And  we  see,  moreover,  how  easily  and 
imperceptibly  the  role  of  any  spirit  is  taken  up  by  the  medium, 
after  the  genuine  information  has  ceased.  .  .   . 

"  At  this  present  moment  it  is  about  eight  months  since  I  had 
my  last  sitting  with  Mrs.  Thompson  in  Paris,  and  yet  when  I 
read  the  notes  again,  it  is  impossible  for  me  to  abstain  from  the 
conviction  that  I  have  really  been  a  witness,  were  it  only  for 
a  few  minutes,  of  the  voluntary  manifestation  of  a  deceased 
person." 


CHAPTER   VII 

ON   THE   INTRA-COSMIC  DIFFICULTIES   OF 
COMMUNICATION 

We  have  now  brought  forward  and  presented  for  the 
reader's  consideration  a  number  of  striking  examples  of 
the  apparent  communication  of  a  deceased  person  with 
the  hving,  through  the  instrumentality  of  a  medium's 
organism ;  and  we  think  that  the  evidence,  supported 
as  it  is  by  great  masses  of  material  of  like  character,  is 
sufficiently  strong  to  warrant  our  belief  in  the  persistence 
of  individual  consciousness  and  personal  identity ;  and 
this  renders  some  form  of  spiritism  necessary,  as  a  work- 
ing hypothesis.  Granting  that  communication  between 
this  world  and  another  is  open  to  us  on  occasion — how, 
we  know  not — it  becomes  a  problem  for  science  to  study 
this  process  of  communication,  and  endeavour  to  ascer- 
tain something  about  it.  There  must  be  tremendous 
difficulties  in  the  way  of  any  sort  of  communication — 
this  being  evidenced  by  the  rarity  of  the  phenomena. 
The  facts  once  admitted,  however,  we  should  set  our- 
selves to  work,  in  an  effort  to  find  out  all  that  we  can 
concerning  them — their  meaning,  and  interpretation — 
and  to  discover,  if  possible,  the  difficulties  that  prevent 
a  greater  facility  for  intra-cosmic  communication. 

We  have  but  little  material  of  our  own  to  add  in  this 
connection  in  the  way  of  original  suggestions,  and  shall 
for  the  most  part  refer  to  the  opinions  of  Drs.  Hodgson 
and  Hyslop,  who  have  studied  Mrs.  Piper  and  the  trance 

505 


506  DEATH 

state  longer  and  more  closely  than  any  one  else  who 
has  so  far  published  a  report  on  a  case  of  this  type. 
There  are  many  facts  to  be  taken  into  consideration  in 
cases  of  this  character,  the  chief  of  which  is  the  pre- 
judice of  the  reader,  which  is  sure  to  colour  his  view- 
point largely  in  his  consideration  of  all  such  phenomena. 
He  expects  to  hear  certain  things,  if  "  spirits  "  are  to  talk 
at  all ;  and  if  he  does  not  hear  the  things  he  anticipates, 
he  immediately  comes  to  the  conclusion  that  no  spirit 
has  been  there  at  all  !  In  other  words,  he  insists  on 
dictating  ivlmt  the  intelligence  shall  say  to  him ;  and  is 
not  content  to  receive  whatever  they  tind  it  possible  to 
give.  Only  when  this  attitude  is  abandoned,  and  more 
sympathetic  open-mindedness  is  shown,  will  progress  be 
made  in  this  field. 

The  chief  objection  raised,  of  course,  by  all,  or  nearly 
all,  is  the  apparent  triviality  of  the  facts  stated,  or  told, 
by  the  communicating  intelligences.  "  If  spirits  are  really 
there,"  we  often  hear,  "  why  do  they  not  tell  us  some- 
thing really  worth  while — something  that  we  do  not 
know  ? "  The  triviality  of  the  incidents  repels  most  in- 
vestigators, and  causes  them  to  conclude  that  no  spiritual 
intelligence  is  really  present  at  all.  This,  however,  is 
quite  an  unjustifiable  conclusion,  as  can  easily  be 
shown. 

In  the  first  place,  we  have  no  reason  to  suppose  that 
I  /  "  spirits  "  have  any  more  knowledge  of  certain  things  than 
we  ourselves  possess.  Only  the  traditions  of  theology 
cause  people  to  cling  to  the  idea  that  spirits  are  in 
possession  of  a  great  amount  of  illumination  and  intel- 
ligence unknown  to  us.  In  reality,  this  conception  is 
contrary  to  all  that  we  know  of  continuity  and  evolu- 
tion ;  and  everything  would  lead  us  to  suppose  that 
spirits,  leaving  the  body,  would  start  in  another  world 
I  just  as  they  left  off  here — no  better  and  no  wiser ;  and 


INTRA-COSMIC  COMMUNICATION         507 

that  any  progress  they  might  make  would  be  due  to 
their  own  effort  and  labour  in  the  next  life.  We  should 
even  have  to  assume  that,  for  some  time  at  least,  imme- 
diately following  physical  death,  the  spirit  would  be  in 
possession  of  far  less  intelligence,  possess  less  mental  life, 
than  it  did  here,  for  the  simple  reason  that  the  shock 
to  consciousness,  which  death  would  surely  occasion, 
would  render  anything  like  the  full  manifestation  of  its 
powers  o[uite  impossible.  (This  seems  to  be  especially 
the  case  with  suicides ;  they  take  a  very  long  time  to 
recover,  and  they  are  not  clear,  mentally,  for  weeks  and 
even  months  after  death.)  However,  all  spirits  do  ulti- 
mately return  to  their  normal  condition,  to  all  appear- 
ances, sooner  or  later.  We  only  make  these  remarks  to 
indicate  that  we  must  not  expect  any  great  intellectual 
brilliancy  or  illumination  from  spirits  soon  after  death. 

Again,  it  has  been  proved  abundantly  that  ordinary 
'persons,  even  here  in  this  life,  deliberately  choose  trivial 
incidents  to  identify  themselves  to  others.  They  do  not 
indulge  in  grand  spiritual  exhortations,  but  in  trivial, 
personal  incidents.  And,  when  we  come  to  think  of  it, 
only  such  incidents  can  ever  prove  personal  identity. 
Suppose  we  are  speaking  to  a  soi-disant  spirit,  through 
a  medium.  He  claims  to  be  so-and-so.  How  do  we 
know  that  it  is  he  ?  Simply  by  getting  him  to  relate 
certain  specific  but  trivial  incidents  connected  with  his 
own  past  life,  and  known  to  no  one  else,  but  which  can 
afterwards  be  verified.  He  could  never  prove  his  identity 
by  any  amount  of  scientific  teaching  or  spiritual  exhorta- 
tion. All  such  material  we  should  have  to  assume,  came 
from  the  subliminal  consciousness  of  the  medium ;  and, 
until  personal  identity  is  established,  we  have  no  proof 
whatever  that  any  intelligence,  other  than  that  of  the 
medium,  is  operative.  But  if  we  obtain  certain  specific 
facts  bearing   on   the  personality  of  the   deceased,  and 


508  DEATH 

seeming  to  indicate  that  his  personality  is  active,  and  can 
accept  it  as  truth ;  then  we  have  some  sort  of  evidence 
that  he  is  really  there — for,  otherwise,  how  account  for 
the  statements  ?  And  when  we  take  into  consideration 
the  well-known  fact  that  persons  will  deliberately  choose 
trivial  incidents  to  identify  themselves  to  others  in  this 
life,  we  are  forced  to  conclude  that  the  only  way  to  settle 
this  question  of  spirit  intercourse  is  to  prove  personal 
identity  by  means  of  trivial,  personal  incidents — just 
such  incidents  as  that  person  would  choose,  were  he 
alive. 

Another  difficulty  that  we  have  to  contend  with  is 
this.  It  is  probable  that  the  conditions  are  so  different 
on  the  "  other  side  "  that  the  communicating  intelligences 
find  it  difficult,  if  not  impossible,  to  describe  things  to 
us  as  they  are,  or  to  make  us  understand  and  appreciate 
them.  Were  a  deaf  man  to  try  to  explain  the  visible 
world  to  a  blind  man ;  or  the  blind  man  the  nature  of 
sound  to  a  deaf  man,  each  would  find  his  task  next  to  an 
impossibility.  He  would  have  no  language  with  Avhich 
to  express  his  thoughts  and  ideas ;  and,  however  hard  he 
might  try,  it  is  improbable  that  the  other  would  ever 
have  any  real  conception  of  that  which  the  other  de- 
scribed. It  is  probably  the  same  in  this  case.  When 
spirits  undertake  to  explain  to  us  the  nature  of  the  next 
life,  and  what  goes  on  there,  they  have  no  language  with 
which  to  express  their  thoughts,  and  we  can  never  get  a 
clear  idea  of  what  their  world  may  be  like.  Again  and 
again  this  is  stated  to  be  the  case  by  those  communicat- 
ing ;  and  it  is  certainly  possible,  not  to  say  probable, 
that  such  is  the  case. 

Still  another  difficulty,  in  obtaining  any  glimpses  of 
intelligence  from  across  the  border,  is  this.  It  is  probable 
that  they  on  the  other  side  do  not  see  us  and  come  into 
direct  contact  with  our  material  world,  any  more  than  we 


INTRA-COSMIC  COMMUNICATION         509 

do  with  theirs.  We  can  see  a  spiritual  world  only  occa- 
sionally, fitfully,  through  the  instrumentality  of  specially 
gifted  seers  ;  and  there  is  evidence  which  seems  to  indicate 
that  they  must  have  "  mediums  "  on  the  other  side,  corre- 
sponding to  our  mediums  on  this  side,  to  permit  of 
communication  at  all !  Thus,  communication  is  not  an 
easy  process,  but  a  difficult  and  tedious  one;  and  it  is 
probable  that  "  spirits  " — granting  that  they  exist — do 
not  come  into  much  closer  personal  contact  with  us  than 
we  do  with  them. 

Still  another  difficulty  in  communicating  is  the  fact 
that  the  nervous  mechanism  of  the  medium,  which  the  \ 
spirit  supposedly  controls,  is  unfamiliar  to  the  operating 
intelligence ;  and  he  or  she  has  to  learn  to  use  it  before 
any  clear  and  systematic  messages  can  be  sent  or  received. 
We  find  no  difficulty  in  operating  our  oivn  nervous 
mechanism,  when  in  health,  because  it  is  educated  to  our 
needs,  and  we  understand  it  thoroughly ;  but  it  must  be 
remembered  that,  even  in  this  life,  such  education  is  a 
long  and  a  tedious  process,  and  that  very  little  is  required 
to  bring  about  a  condition  which  prevents  the  proper 
operation  of  that  nervous  mechanism.  How  much 
greater  must  be  the  difficulty  experienced  by  a  spirit 
in  working,  or  operating,  through  the  nervous  mechanism 
of  another  organism  entirely !  It  is  a  wonder  that  any- 
thing clear  and  systematic  is  obtained  at  all ! 

There  is  yet  another  difficulty  to  be  overcome  before 
any  clear  messages  are  received  from  the  other  side  ; 
and,  to  some,  this  difficulty  is  the  greatest  of  all.  Both 
Dr.  Hodgson  and  Dr.  Hyslop  take  this  view,  which  is 
now  very  widely  accepted  in  certain  directions.  The 
difficulty  is  this.  It  is  probable,  both  from  the  contents 
of  the  messages  and  from  actual  statements  made  by  the 
communicators,  that  the  intelligence  has  to  pass  into  a 
more  or  less  abnormal  or  dream-like  state  of  conscious- 


510  DEATH 

ness,  while  communicating.  However  normal  such  an 
individual  may  be,  in  his  ordinary  life  (so  to  speak),  he 
must  enter  this  sort  of  dream-like  or  trance  condition,  to 
communicate ;  and  this  would,  of  course,  befog  his  mind, 
and  render  the  so-called  communications  confused  and 
uncertain.  Dr.  Hodgson  first  pointed  this  out,  and  in- 
sisted very  strongly  upon  this  fact  in  his  Second  Report 
(Proceedings  of  the  Society  for  Psychical  Research,  vol.  xiii., 
pp.  284-5  82).  He  then  clearly  indicated  the  difficul- 
ties which  we  should  expect  ''  spirits  "  to  experience,  who 
are  really  communicating  with  us.  Dr.  Hyslop  has 
lately  defended  and  extended  this  view%  and,  in  his 
latest  book,  Psychical  Research  and  the  Resurrection,  he 
says : — 

"  One  good  illustration  of  this  abnormal  mental  condition  on 
the  part  of  communicators  is  found  in  an  incident  told  me  by 
Dr.  Hodgson  before  his  death,  and  which  I  have  mentioned  else- 
where in  another  periodical.  It  was  the  incident  of  a  communi- 
cator telling  through  Mrs.  Piper  a  circumstance  which  he  said 
had  represented  some  act  of  his  life.  But  inquiry  showed  that 
no  such  act  had  been  performed  by  him  when  living.  But  it 
turned  out  that  he  had  made  the  same  statement  in  the  delirium  of 
death.  It  is  especially  noticeable  in  certain  forms  of  com- 
munication of  the  '  possession '  type  that  the  last  scenes  of  the 
deceased  are  acted  over  again  in  their  first  attempts  to  control 
or  communicate.  The  mental  confusion  relevant  to  the  death 
of  my  father  was  apparent  in  his  first  attempt  to  communi- 
cate through  Mrs.  Piper,  and  when  I  recalled  this  period  of  his 
dying  experience,  this  confusion  was  repeated  in  a  remarkable 
manner  with  several  evidential  features  in  the  messajjes. 
Twice  an  uncle  lost  the  sense  of  personal  identity  in  the 
attempt  to  communicate.  His  communications  were  in  fact  so 
confused  that  it  was  two  years  before  he  became  at  all  clear 
in  his  efforts.  He  had  died  as  the  result  of  a  sudden  accident. 
Once  my  father,  after  mentioning  the  illness  of  my  Hving  sister 
and  her  name,  lost  his  personal  identity  long  enough  to  confuse 


INTRA-COSMIC  COMMUNICATION         511 

incidents  relating  to  liimself  and  his  earthly  life  with  those  that 
applied  to  my  sister  and  not  to  himself.  The  interesting  feature 
of  the  incident  was  that,  having  failed  to  complete  his  messages 
a  few  minutes  previously,  when  he  came  back  the  second  time 
to  try  it  again,  Rector,  the  control,  warned  me  that  he  was  a 
little  confused,  but  that  what  he  wanted  to  tell  me  certainly 
referred  to  my  sister  Lida.  Then  came  the  message,  claiming 
experiences  for  himself,  when  living,  that  were  verifiable  as  my 
sister's.  On  any  theory  of  the  facts  a  confused  state  of  mind  is 
the  only  explanation  of  them,  and  when  associated  with  inci- 
dents of  a  supernormal  and  evidential  character  they  afford 
reasonable  attestation  of  the  hypothesis  here  suggested." 

The  following  quotation  further  exemplifies  this 
view : — 

"  At  this  point  Dr.  Hodgson  read  over  the  automatic  writing 
to  indicate  that  he  had  got  the  message  and  how  he  under- 
stood it.     The  communications  then  went  on  : — 

"'Your  thoughts  do  grasp  mine.  Well  now  you  have  just 
what  I  have  been  wanting  to  come  and  make  clear  to  you,  H., 
old  fellow.' 

"  ('  It  is  quite  clear '). 

"  '  Yes,  you  see  I  am  more  awake  than  asleep,  yet  I  cannot 
come  just  as  I  am  in  reality,  independently  of  the  medium's 
hght.' 

"  ('  You  come  much  better  than  the  others.')  '  Yes,  because  I 
am  a  little  nearer  and  not  less  intelligent  than  some  others  here.'  " 

"  At  one  of  Dr.  Hodgson's  later  sittings  the  same  communi- 
cator, George  Pelham,  used  the  word  '  prisoned '  in  a  passage 
in  which  '  prisoning '  was  in  Dr.  Hodgson's  view  the  more 
correct  term,  and  he  suggested  the  correction.  George  Pelham 
broke  out  with  the  reply  : — 

"  '  See  here,  H.,  "  Don't  view  me  with  a  critic's  eye,  but  pass 
my  imperfections  by."  Of  course  I  know  all  that  as  well  as 
anybody  on  your  sphere.  I  tell  you,  old  fellow,  it  don't  do  to 
pick  [out]  all  these  little  errors  too  much  when  they  amount  to 
nothing  in  one  way.     You  have  light  enough  and  brain  enough. 


512  DEATH 

I  know,  to  understand  my  explanations  of  being  shut  up  in  this 
body  [that  of  the  medium],  dreaming  as  it  were  and  trying  to 
help  on  science.  .   .  .' 

"  We  have    only  to  study  dreams  and  deliria    in    order  to 
understand  the  influences  which  tend  to  produce  confusion  and 
fragmentary  messages.     If  accidents  and  shocks  in  life  which 
are  less  violent  than  death  disturb  the  memory,  as  we  know 
they  do ;  the  student  of  abnormal  psychology,  being  perfectly 
familiar  with  the  phenomena  in  numerous  cases,  would  expect 
that  so  violent  a  change  as  death  would  disturb  memory  and  re- 
production still  more  seriously.     Add  to  this  the  mind's  freedom 
from  the  body  with  all  the  physiological  inhibitions  cut  off,  and 
we  might  well  expect  less  control  of  the  processes  which  recall 
the  past  in  the  proper  way  for  illustrating  one's  identity.     This 
disturbance  might  not  last  indefinitely.     The  individual  might 
fully  recover  from  it  in  a  normal  spiritual  life,  though  the  time 
for  this  recovery  might  vary  with  individuals  and  with  the  cir- 
cumstances of  their  death.     But  the  recovery  of  a  normal  mental 
balance  in  the  proper  ethereal  environment  on  the  '  other  side ' 
would  not  of  itself  be  a  complete  guarantee  of  its  retention 
when  coming  into  terrestrial  and  material  conditions  to  com- 
municate.    We  may  well  suppose  it  possible  that  this  '  coming 
back'  produces  an  effect  similar  to  the  amnesia  which  so  often 
accompanies  a  shock  or  sudden   interference  with  the  normal 
stream  of  consciousness.     The  effect  seems  to  be  the  same  as 
that  of  certain  kinds  of  dissociation  which  are  now  being  studied 
by  the  student  of  abnormal  psychology,  and  this  is  the  disturb- 
ance of  memory  which  makes  it  difficult  or  impossible  to  recall 
in  one  mental  state  the  events  which   have  been  experienced 
in    another.     G.    P.    showed   always   an   impressively   marked 
and  characteristic  personality.     Hart,  on  the  other  hand,  did 
not  become  so  clear  till  many  months  later.     I  learned  long 
afterwards  that  his  illness  had   been  much   longer  and   more 
fundamental  than  I  had  supposed.      The  continued  confusion 
in  his   case   seemed   explicable  if  taken   in    relation  with  the 
circumstances    of    his  prolonged    illness,    including    fever,   but 
there  was    no    assignable   relation  between   his   confusion  and 
the  state  of  my  own  mind.   .   .   . 


INTRA-COSMIC  COMMUNICATION         513 

"  But  the  proper  evidence  for  this  dream  life  or  semi-trance 
and  somnambulic  condition  will  be  found  in  incidents  which 
also  contain  supernormal  facts.  I  quote  one  of  remarkable 
interest.  A  man  who  had  had  sittings  with  Mrs.  Piper  before 
his  death,  some  time  after  his  decease,  which  took  place  in 
Paris,  turned  up  as  a  communicator  without  Mrs.  Piper  having 
known  of  his  death.  He  had  always  been  perplexed  by  the 
confusion  and  fragmentary  nature  of  the  messages  of  his 
deceased  friend  George  Pelham.  When  he  himself  became  a 
communicator,  it  was  some  time  before  he  was  able  to  com- 
municate clearly.  When  he  could  communicate  he  delivered 
the  following  message  to  Dr.  Hodgson : — 

"  *  What  in  the  world  is  the  reason  you  never  call  for  me  ? 
I  am  not  sleeping.  I  wish  to  help  you  in  identifying  myself. 
I  am  a  good  deal  better  now.' 

*'  (*  You  were  confused  at  first.') 

"  <  Very,  but  I  did  not  really  understand  how  confused  I  was. 
I  am  more  so  when  I  try  to  speak  to  you.  I  understand  now 
why  George  spelled  his  words  to  me.' 

"  The  allusion  to  George  Pelham's  spelling  out  his  words  is 
an  evidential  incident,  as  it  was  verifiable.  He  recognised  after 
death  the  explanation  of  confusions  which  he  could  not  under- 
stand while  living.  A  similar  though  not  evidential  passage 
came  from  this  George  Pelham  himself.  It  represents  the 
point  of  view  which  I  am  advancing  to  account  for  the  curious 
nature  of  the  messages,  and  was  perhaps  the  communication 
which  suggested  the  theory  to  Dr.  Hodgson.  I  quote  it  from 
the  latter's  report : — 

" '  Remember  we  share  and  always  shall  have  our  friends  in 
the  dream  life,  i.e.  your  life  so  to  speak,  which  will  attract  us 
for  ever  and  ever,  and  so  long  as  we  have  any  friends  sleeping 
in  the  material  world  ; — you  to  us  are  more  like  as  we  under- 
stand sleep,  you  look  shut  up  as  one  in  prison,  and  in  order  for 
us  to  get  into  communication  with  you,  we  have  to  enter  into 
your  sphere,  as  one  like  yourself  asleep.  This  is  just  why  we 
make  mistakes  as  you  call  them,  or  get  confused  and  muddled, 
so  to  put  it,  H.' 

"  The  general  supposition  which,  to  the  mind  of  Dr.  Hodgson 

2k 


514  DEATH 

and  myself,  explains  the  persistent  triviality  and  confusion  of 
the  messages  is  that  the  communicating  spirit  at  the  time  of  com- 
municating  (not  necessarily  in  his  normal  state  in  the  spirit  world) 
is  in  a  sort  of  abnormal  mental  state,  p>er haps  resembling  our  dream 
life  or  somnamhulic  condition.  We  cannot  determine  exactly 
what  this  mental  condition  is  at  present  and  may  never  be  able 
to  do  so,  but  it  can  be  variously  compared  to  dream  life, 
somnambulism,  hypnosis  of  certain  kinds,  trance,  secondary 
personality,  subliminal  mental  action,  or  any  of  those  mental 
conditions  in  which  there  is  more  or  less  of  disintegration  of  the 
normal  memory.  Ordinary  delirium  has  some  analogies  with  it, 
but  the  incidents  are  too  purposive  and  too  systematic  in  many 
cases  to  press  this  analogy  to  any  general  extent.  But  the 
various  disturbances  of  the  normal  consciousness  or  personality 
in  the  living  offer  clear  illustrations  of  the  psychological  pheno- 
mena which  we  produce  as  evidence  of  spirits  when  these 
phenomena  are  supernormally  produced. 

"  But  this  hypothesis  does  not  explain  all  the  confusion 
involved.  There  is  the  more  or  less  unusual  condition  of  the 
medium,  mental  and  physical.  The  medium  through  which 
the  messages  purport  to  come  is  in  a  trance  condition,  and 
when  not  a  trance  the  condition  is  one  which  is  not  usual,  and 
perhaps  in  the  broad  sense  may  be  called  abnormal,  though  not 
technically  this  in  any  important  sense.  This  condition  offers 
many  obstacles  to  perfect  transmission  of  messages.  It  is  illus- 
trated in  many  cases  of  somnambulism  in  which  the  stream  of 
consciousness  goes  on  uninhibited,  and  when  this  is  suppressed, 
as  it  is  in  deep  trances,  the  difficulty  is  to  get  systematic  com- 
munications through  it.  Add  to  this  the  frequently  similar 
condition  of  the  communicator,  according  to  the  hypothesis,  and 
we  can  well  imagine  what  causes  triviality  and  confusion.  The 
student  of  abnormal  psychology  will  recognise  the  applicability 
of  this  view  at  once,  even  though  he  is  not  prepared  to  admit 
that  it  is  a  true  theory. 

"  There  are  two  aspects  of  such  an  hypothesis  which  have  to 
be  considered.  They  are  its  fitness  or  explanatory  character, 
and  its  evidential  features.  They  are  quite  distinct  from  each 
other.     The  hypothesis  might  fit  and  yet  have  no  evidence  that 


INTRA-COSMIC  COMMUNICATION         515 

it  was  a  fact.  I  think,  however,  that  all  who  are  familiar  with 
abnormal  mental  phenomena  will  admit  without  special  conten- 
tion that  the  hypothesis  will  explain  the  triviality  and  confusion 
of  the  alleged  messages,  but  they  will  want  to  know  what 
evidence  exists  for  such  a  view.  It  is  to  this  aspect  of  the 
theory  that  we  must  now  turn. 

"  Dr.  Hodgson  had  discussed  this  supposition  in  his  report 
on  the  Piper  case  in  1898.  It  is  therefore  not  new,  and  some 
incidents  in  his  communications  seem  to  point  to  the  influence 
of  this  view  on  his  messages.  I  shall  quote  one  passage  from 
his  report  in  illustration  of  the  hypothesis  and  of  some  of  his 
evidence  for  it : — 

" '  That  persons  just  deceased,'  says  this  report  (p.  377), 
'  should  be  extremely  confused  and  unable  to  communicate 
directly,  or  even  at  all,  seems  perfectly  natural  after  the  shock 
and  wrench  of  death.  Thus  in  the  case  of  Hart,  he  was  unable 
to  write  the  second  day  after  his  death.  In  another  case  a 
friend  of  mine,  whom  I  may  call  D.,  wrote,  with  what  appeared 
to  be  much  difficulty,  his  name  and  the  words,  "  I  am  all  right 
now.  Adieu,"  within  two  or  three  days  after  his  death.  In 
another  case  F.,  a  near  relative  of  Madame  Elisa,  was  unable  to 
write  on  the  morning  after  his  death.  On  the  second  day  after, 
when  a  stranger  was  present  with  me  for  a  sitting,  he  wrote 
two  or  three  sentences,  saying,  "  I  am  too  weak  to  articulate 
clearly,"  and  not  many  days  later  he  wrote  fairly  well  and 
clearly,  and  dictated  also  to  Madame  Elisa,  as  amanuensis,  an 
account  of  his  feelings  at  finding  himself  in  his  new  surround- 
ings. Both  D.  and  F.  became  very  clear  in  a  short  time. 
D.  communicated  later  on  frequently,  both  by  writing  and 
speech.' " 

We  think  that,  were  we  to  assume  the  truth  of  some 
such  theory  as  the  above — and  there  is  a  great  deal  of 
evidence  in  its  favour — we  could  account  for  nearly  all 
the  difficulties  involved,  and  could  see  why  it  is  that 
more  definite  information  is  not  received  from  the  "  other 
side." 


516  DEATH 

There  are  doubtless  other  difficulties  also  which  the 
communicating  intelligence  would  have  to  overcome, 
some  of  which  have  been  pointed  out  in  the  before- 
mentioned  report.  But  for  the  sake  of  our  present 
purposes  the  above  will  at  least  suffice  to  illustrate  the 
enormous  difficulties  which  we  should  expect  any  surviv- 
ing "  spirit "  to  have  to  overcome  were  he  to  attempt  to 
send  '*  messages  "  to  those  still  in  the  body. 


CHAPTEH  VIII 

CONCLUSIONS 

We  now  approach  the  termination  of  a  task  which  has 
been,  for  both  of  us,  a  labour  of  love  and  of  keen  in- 
tellectual enjoyment. 

In  the  First  Part  of  this  volume,  we  studied  death  from 
its  purely  physical  or  physiological  side;  summed  up 
what  was  known  of  death,  and  advanced  our  ov\^n  separate 
theories  as  to  the  nature  of  the  change  which  we  see 
before  us.  Whether  true  or  not,  such  speculations  are 
not,  we  hope,  without  value  —  if  only  because  of  the 
impulse  they  may  give  others  to  speculate  in  this  direc- 
tion. If  we  have  succeeded,  in  any  way,  in  formulating  a 
definite  theory  or  conception  of  the  nature  of  life  and  of 
death,  that,  too,  is  not  without  its  interest  to  science. 

In  Part  II.  we  considered  the  varied  speculations  in 
which  man  has  indulged  since  he  began  to  consider  these 
great  questions ;  and  found  that,  although  the  common 
arguments  afford  a  strong  presumption  in  favour  of  con- 
scious survival,  they  none  of  them  prove  it,  or  Avarrant  our 
belief  on  such  grounds  alone. 

Part  III.  we  devoted  to  a  discussion  of  the  scientific 
evidence  (or,  rather,  a  very  small  part  of  it)  for  "  survival " 
— the  strength  of  which  the  reader  must  decide  for  him- 
self, /^aken  en  masse,  we  cannot  help  feeling  that  we 
have^Kere  a  great  quantity  of  material,  all  evidence  of 
the  supernormal  and  pointing  to  "  spiritism  "  as  its  most 
intelligible  interpretation  —  which  must"  'accordingly  be 


517 


518  DEATH 

looked  upon  as  a  rational  theory,  and  accepted  provision- 
ally as  a  "  working  hypothesis."  It  may  not  be  absolutely 
proved  by  the  evidence  in  the  case,  but  every  theory  has 
a  right  to  be  tested — -and  a  right  to  win  acceptance,  if  it 
be  found  to  fit  into  and  satisfactorily  explain  all  the  facts, 
The  nature  of  death  is  likely  to  remain  unsolved  for 
many  years  to  come — so  long  as  we  are  ignorant  of  the 
nature  of  life.  When  the  one  is  isolated,  and  its  inner- 
most "  essence  "  known,  then  we  shall  know  and  under- 
stand the  other.  But  in  this  field,  as  in  all  others,  there 
must  be  pioneers — the  first  crude  attempts  must  be  made 
to  solve  the  problem.  We  can  but  hope  that  our  book 
may  in  some  way  have  helped  to  solve  it — may,  perhaps, 
be  a  starting-point  for  future  work  by  qualified  experts. 
The  world-old  problem,  "  If  a  man  die,  shall  he  live 
again  ? "  might,  perhaps,  be  answered,  were  we  to  study 
minutely  and  carefully  enough  the  evidence  bearing  upon 
this  all-important  subject — Death. 


APPENDICES 

APPENDIX  A 

On  "  Vampires." 

For  several  centuries  there  has  existed  a  belief  in  vampires 
in  certain  parts  of  the  world,  especially  in  Silesia,  in  Moravia, 
and  along  the  frontier  of  Hungary.  Even  to  this  day  such 
stories  are  circulated  among  the  people,  and  implicitly 
credited  by  them.  It  is  asserted  that  certain  persons,  who 
have  died,  have  the  power  of  returning  from  time  to  time 
(generally  at  night)  and  sucking  the  blood  of  living  persons ; 
and  that  in  this  manner  they  are  enabled  to  maintain  them- 
selves in  a  state,  if  not  of  life,  certainly  one  very  different 
from  death.  They  are  supposed  to  be  enabled  to  maintain 
this  sort  of  intra-cosmic  existence  so  long  as  they  can  find 
fresh  blood  with  which  to  supply  themselves.  Preferably 
they  attack  young  persons  who  are  full-blooded  and  possess 
an  abundance  of  vitality.  Occasionally  these  persons  wake 
during  the  process,  and  frightful  have  been  some  of  the 
fights  that  are  said  to  have  taken  place  between  mortal  and 
vampire !  Sometimes  one  and  sometimes  the  other  would 
be  victor.  More  commonly,  however,  the  person  so  attacked 
would  not  wake,  and  then  he  or  she  would  rise  in  the  mornino- 
pale,  emaciated,  weak,  and  exhausted,  for  no  apparent  reason. 
This  went  on,  as  a  rule,  until  that  person  died,  when  another 
would  be  attacked  in  like  manner.  This  would  continue 
until  the  vampire  was  finally  caught,  exhumed,  his  head 
cut  off,  and  his  heart  cut  out  or  impaled ;  when,  with  a 
fearful  shriek,  he  would  finally  give  up  the  ghost.  When 
the  body  of  the  vampire  was  impaled,  fresh  blood  would 
gush  out.  The  body  would  be  so  full  of  blood,  on  occasion, 
that  it  could  scarcely  contain  it  all ;  and  it  would  be  found 
dripping  from  the  lips,  or  even  exuding  from  the  eyes,  ears, 

519 


520  APPENDICES 

and  pores  of  the  skin !  Any  one  bitten  by  a  vampire  would 
become  one  himself  when  his  turn  came  to  die.  Such  was 
the  gruesome  belief  held  for  several  hundred  years  in  parts 
of  Europe,  and  which  is  even  yet  not  extinct. 

In  a  curious  old  work  entitled  llic  Phantom  World,  its 
author,  Augustine  Calmet,  a  priest,  attempted  to  find  a 
rational  explanation  of  these  stories,  and  his  ingenious 
speculations  will  be  found  in  vol.  ii.  of  that  treatise.  He 
says : — 

"  I  lay  down  at  first  this  principle,  that  it  may  be  that  there 
are  corpses  which,  although  interred  some  days,  shed  fluid  blood 
through  the  pores  of  their  body"  (p.  41). 

Although  this  can  hardly  be  said  to  be  so,  it  is  almost  the 
case,  on  occasion,  as  may  be  seen  by  referring  to  the  discus- 
sion under  "  Putrefaction,"  pp.  37-8.  However,  our  author 
goes  on : — 

"  I  add,  moreover,  that  it  is  very  easy  for  certain  people  to 
fancy  themselves  sucked  by  vampires,  and  that  the  fear  caused 
by  that  fancy  should  make  a  revolution  in  their  frame  sufiiciently 
violent  to  deprive  them  of  life." 

The  author  was  evidently  well  aware  of  the  power  of 
"  suggestion  "  !  Keturning  to  the  original  theme,  however, 
he  continues : — 

"  I  now  come  to  those  corpses  full  of  fluid  blood,  and  whose 
hair,  beard,  and  nails  had  grown  again.  One  may  dispute  these 
parts  of  the  prodigies,  and  be  very  complaisant  if  we  admit  the 
truth  of  a  few  of  them.  All  philosophers  know  well  enough 
how  much  the  people,  and  even  certain  historians,  enlarge  upon 
things  which  appear  but  a  little  extraordinary.  Nevertheless, 
it  is  not  impossible  to  explain  their  cause  physically.  Experi- 
ence teaches  us  that  there  are  certain  kinds  of  earth  which  will 
preserve  dead  bodies  perfectly  fresh.  The  reasons  for  this  have 
been  often  explained  without  my  giving  myself  the  trouble  to 
make  a  particular  recital  of  them.  ...  As  to  the  growth  of  the 
nails,  the  hair,  and  the  beard,  it  is  often  perceived  in  many 
corpses.  While  there  yet  remains  a  good  deal  of  moisture  in 
the  body,  it  is  not  surprising  that  some  time  we  see  some  augmen- 
tation in  those  parts  which  do  not  demand  a  vital  spirit.  .   .  . 


APPENDICES  521 

"The  fluid  blood  flowing  through  the  canals  of  the  body 
seems  to  form  a  greater  difiiculty,  but  physical  reasons  may  be 
given  for  this.  It  might  very  well  happen  that  the  heat  of  the 
sun,  warming  the  nitrous  and  sulphurous  particles  which  are 
formed  in  those  earths  that  are  proper  for  preserving  the  body, 
those  particles  having  incorporated  themselves  in  the  newly- 
interred  corpses,  ferment,  decoagulate,  and  melt  the  curdled 
blood,  render  it  liquid,  and  give  it  the  power  of  flowing  by 
degrees  through  all  the  canals.  ...  As  to  the  cry  uttered  by 
the  vampires  when  the  stake  is  driven  through  their  heart, 
nothing  is  more  natural ;  the  air  which  is  there  confined,  and 
thus  expelled  by  violence,  necessarily  produces  that  noise  in 
passing  through  the  throat.  .   .  ." 

The  figures  of  the  vampires  that  were  seen,  Calmet  con- 
siders to  be  apparitions,  occasionally  helped  out  by  dreams 
and  other  morbid  phenomena.  Considering  the  fact  that 
this  author  lived  and  wrote  in  1751,  his  speculations  may 
be  considered  quite  remarkable. 

Vampires  are,  however,  not  unknown  in  these  days.  In 
an  article  on  "  Vampires  "  in  The  Occult  Revie^u,  June  1908, 
Dr.  Hartmann  described  a  method  of  what  might  be  termed 
natural  vampirage.     He  said  : — 

"  In  the  Bible  it  is  claimed  that  when  David  grew  old,  a 
young  girl  was  given  to  him  to  supply  him  with  vitality  ;  and  not 
very  many  years  ago  certain  institutions  based  upon  this  principle 
were  existing  in  France.  Young  girls  were  supplied  to  old  men 
or  women  as  bedfellows.  Usually  the  old  person  (after  having 
had  to  submit  to  certain  precautionary  measures)  had  to  sleep 
between  two  girls,  a  fair-haired  and  a  dark  one,  for  which  privi- 
lege he  had  to  pay  a  certain  sum.  All  of  these  girls  soon  lost 
vitality,  some  of  them  died,  and  these  establishments  were 
finally  closed  by  order  of  the  police." 

If  popular  opinion  is  correct  in  its  assumption  that  vitality 
may  thus  be  transferred  from  the  young  to  the  old,  it  is  easy 
to  understand  that  there  may  be  a  great  deal  of  truth  in  the 
theory  that  it  is  not  healthy  for  children  to  sleep  in  the 
same  bed  with  old  persons.  Certainly  medical  science  has 
given  at  least  tacit  approbation  to  this  opinion. 

Dr.  Hartmann  also  cites  the  case  of  the  "  wonder  girl "  at 


522  APPENDICES 

Radein,  who  attracted  considerable  attention  some  time  ago. 
For  seven  years,  according  to  the  statement  of  investigators, 
this  girl  lived  without  food  or  drink,  and  yet  was  able  to 
maintain  phenomenally  good  health !  According  to  Dr. 
Hartmann's  theory,  she  lived  upon  the  vitality  of  others. 

**  Instead  of  taking  food,"  he  says,  "  she  withdrew  vitality 
from  the  children  who  were  brought  to  her  for  the  purpose  of 
receiving  her  blessing.  Some  of  these  children  sickened,  some 
wasted  away  and  died.  She  did  not  do  this  consciously  and 
willingly,  for  she  was  a  very  pious  person,  and,  owing  to  her 
long  fasting,  even  considered  a  saint." 

There  are  historical  records  of  many  similar  cases,  but 
nearly  all  of  them  have  been  proved  to  be  fraudulent ;  and 
at  the  present  day  science  refuses  to  accept  any  of  them  as 
authentic. 


APPENDIX   B 

Life  and  Vitality. 

Several  times  we  have  had  occasion  to  refer  to  the  theory 
of  vitality,  outlined  and  defended  in  Vitality,  Fasting  ami 
Nutrition ;  and  it  might  be  well,  in  this  place,  briefly  to 
refer  to  the  argument  there  set  forth.  It  will  only  be 
possible  to  mention  a  few  of  the  arguments,  and  those 
briefly ;  but  it  may  suffice,  at  all  events,  to  give  the  reader 
an  idea  of  the  theory  and  render  the  subsequent  argument 
clearer.     In  brief,  the  theory  is  this : — 

The  generally  accepted  view  of  the  causation  of  vital  energy  is 
.somewhat  as  follows  : — Food  taken  into  the  body  is  burned  up  or 
oxidised  in  it ;  and  during  this  process  of  oxidation  energy  is 
liberated  and  given  to  the  system,  in  very  much  the  same  way 
as  the  fuel  of  the  engine  supplies  it  with  energy.  In  fact,  the 
two  (the  engine  and  the  human  body)  have  been  frequently 
compared  by  physiologists,  and  their  similarity  is  apparently 
true ;  but  I  endeavoured  to  show  that  the  body  does  not  derive 
its  energy  from  the  food  eaten  at  all,  but  from  another  source 
altogether,  and  that  the  present  system  of  regarding  the  vital 


APPENDICES  523 

energy  of  the  body  as  due  to  food  combustion  (chemical  com- 
bustion) is  totally  false.  I  believe  that  the  present  theory  is 
disproved  by  a  number  of  arguments — chief  among  them  being 
the  phenomena  of  fasting,  which  show  that  patients  frequently, 
if  not  invariably,  get  stronger  as  the  fast  progresses,  whereas 
they  should  get  weaker.  If  the  daily  food  supplied  the  strength 
of  the  body  and  its  vital  energy,  it  should  weaken  when  this  food 
is  withdrawn,  but  the  facts  are  that — in  all  diseased  conditions 
at  any  rate — this  is  not  the  case,  and  that  patients  who  enter 
upon  a  fast  so  weak  and  debilitated  that  they  cannot  walk  down 
stairs,  are  strong  enough  to  be  walking  four  and  five  miles  a 
day,  at  its  conclusion,  and  after  having  fasted  forty  or  fifty  days  ! 
Again,  we  need  only  observe  the  facts  of  everyday  experience. 
If  we  derived  our  energies  from  the  food  eaten,  it  would  only 
be  necessary  to  go  first  to  the  dining-room  and  then  to  the 
gymnasium,  in  order  to  recuperate  our  strength  and  energies. 
But  we  all  know  from  actual,  practical  experience  that  such  is 
not  the  case  :  we  must  seek  sleep  and  rest  at  the  end  of  a  trying 
day's  work,  and  nothing  will  take  the  place  of  this  rest  and  sleep, 
and  no  amount  of  food  will  replace  the  energy  lost.  There  is 
therefore  some  source  of  energy  other  than  the  food,  distinguish- 
ing the  body  from  the  engine  on  that  account — whose  energies 
are  derived  exclusively  from  the  fuel  consumed.  In  the  self- 
recuperative  powers  of  the  organism,  and  in  its  necessity  for 
sleep,  I  see  distinctions  which  differentiate  it  from  the  engine 
or  any  other  mechanically  operating  machine.  "The  engine 
does  not  recuperate  and  restore  itself,  during  its  periods  of  rest, 
and  the  body  does ;  the  engine  continues  to  wear  out,  and  can 
never  replace  its  own  parts  by  new  ones,  and  the  body  can.  .  .  . 
The  great  difference  between  them  is  that  one  is  self-recuperative 
and  human  and  needs  sleep  in  order  to  effect  this  ;  and  the  other 
is  not  self -recuperative,  and  needs  no  rest,  so  long  as  it  works  at 
all ;  and,  in  spite  of  this  most  obvious  and  all-important  differ- 
ence (since  sleep  is  the  greatest  restorer  of  vital  energy,  as  daily 
observation  shows),  and  merely  to  bolster  up  the  absurd  attempt 
to  include  vital  force  in  the  law  of  conservation ;  and  in  spite 
of  the  most  everyday  and  obvious  proofs  to  the  contrary,  the 
scientific  world  has  continued  to  ignore  this  question  of  sleep 
altogether,  and  to  treat  this  matter  of  the  renewal  of  the  vital 
force  by  food  as  a  proved  fact,  instead  of  a  mere  theory — open 
to  these  very  objections,  and  a  monstrous  absurdity  because  of 
them.  In  short,  the  plain  difi'erences  between  the  human  body 
and  the  steam  engine  have  been  completely  ignored,  and  treated 
as    if    they    were    non-existent — merely    because    they    were 


524  APPENDICES 

impossible  to  dovetail  into  the  present  materialistic  theory  .  .  ." 
(pp.  244-5). 

I  contend,  in  short,  that  the  life  or  vital  force  is  wrongly 
placed  in  the  circle  of  forces,  each  of  which  is  convertible  into 
the  other — i.e.,  it  is  wrongly  placed  in  the  law  of  conservation  of 
energy.  I  hold  that  "  life  is  absolutely  alone,  separate,  distinct, 
per  se"  and  that  "it  is  in  no  wise  related  to,  or  derivable  from, 
any  of  the  other  forces."  I  believe  that  we  replenish  our 
energies  by  rest  and  sleep  alone  (this  giving  us  a  new  theory  of 
sleep) — it  being  defined  as  "that  physiological  condition  of  the 
organism  in  which  the  nervous  system  of  the  individual  (in 
precisely  the  same  manner  as  the  electric  storage  battery)  is 
being  recharged  from  without,  by  the  external,  all-pervading, 
cosmic  energy,  in  which  we  are  bathed,  and  in  which  we  live 
and  move  and  have  our  being  "  (p.  309).  I  conceive  the  organism 
as  a  vehicle  for  transmitting  vital  energy,  merely — "  we  have  the 
will  to  expend,  but  never  to  make  or  '  manufacture '  this  energy 
by  any  means  in  our  power.  I  contend,  further,  that  the  body 
is  not  an  exact  parallel,  in  its  action,  to  the  steam  engine  .  .  . 
but  rather  resembles  the  eleciric  motor  which  has  the  power  of 
recharging  itself  with  life  or  vital  energy,  just  as  the  motor  of 
the  electrician  receives  its  energy  from  some  external  source — 
the  brain  or  nervous  system  being  that  part  of  us  which  is  thus 
recharged,  and  constituting  the  motor  of  the  human  body ;  that 
this  recharging  process  takes  place  during  the  hours  of  rest,  and 
particularly  of  sleep,  and  at  such  times  only — all  activity  denoting 
merely  an  expenditure  or  waste  of  this  vital  force ;  that  we  can 
thus  only  allow  or  permit  vitality  to  flow  into  us,  as  it  were,  in 
this  recharging  process — such  coming  from  the  universal,  all- 
pervading,  cosmic  energy,  with  which  we  are  surrounded,  and 
which  our  nervous  systems  (and  bodies)  merely  transmit  or 
transform  into  the  external  work  of  the  world — acting  merely 
as  channels  through  which  the  all-pervading  energy  may  find 
personal  expression ;  channels  through  which  it  may  indi- 
vidually manifest"  (pp.  249-50).  Death  was  defined  by  me 
then  as  "that  condition  of  the  organism  which  renders 
no  longer  possible  the  transmission  or  manifestation  of  vital 
force  through  it — which  condition  is  probably  a  poisoned  state 
of  the  nervous  system — due,  in  turn,  to  the  whole  system 
becoming  poisoned  by  toxic  material  absorbed  from  the  blood  " 
(pp.  330-1). 

Now,  if  the  vital  energies,  the  life  forces,  are  not  dependent 
upon  the  daily  food,  then  materialism  is  threatened — for  it  is 
doubtful  if  life,  or  the  vital  forces  of  the  body,  can  be  classed 


APPENDICES  525 

with  the  other  energies  of  the  universe,  they  seem  rather  to 
occupy  a  separate  place.  I  pointed  this  out  at  the  end  of  my 
chapter  on  "  Vitality,"  where  I  said  (pp.  300-3)  : — 

"It  is  not  the  province  of  this  book  to  touch  upon  the  wider 
problems  of  world  philosophy  or  metaphysics,  but  I  cannot  refrain 
from  adding  one  or  two  remarks  upon  what  I  conceive  to  be  the 
logical  philosophic  import  of  my  theory.  For  I  can  see  in  it 
far  more  than  a  mere  scheme  of  vitality  ;  more  than  a  mere 
speculation  as  to  its  nature  and  its  relation  to  the  human 
organism  and  to  the  intake  of  food  ;  more  than  its  revolutionary 
effect  upon  medical  practice — important  as  these  should  be.  It 
is  more  than  all  these.  It  is  an  answer,  if  not  an  absolute  re- 
futation, of  the  present,  generally  accepted  materialistic  doctrine 
of  the  universe,  and  its  influence  upon  our  conceptions  of  the 
origin  and  destiny  of  the  human  soul.  Without  further  ado,  let 
me  illustrate  the  great  importance  of  the  theory  in  its  application 
to  the  phenomena  of  mind,  and  the  world-old  question  of  the 
immortality  of  the  soul. 

"  I  have  endeavoured  to  show,  in  the  preceding  pages,  that  the 
life  or  vital  force  is  in  no  way  inter-related  with,  transformable 
and  transmutable  into  any  one  or  other  of  the  physical  forces 
known  to  us ;  that  it  seems  to  stand  absolutely  imr  se,  in  this 
respect,  and  that,  in  fact,  its  laws  and  actions  are,  apparently, 
totally  different  from — if  not  actually  opposed  to — the  other 
forces,  in  their  actions  and  laws ;  that  it  is  in  no  way  related  to 
them,  and  that  the  nervous  or  life  energies  are  different,  toto 
ccelo,  from  all  other  forces  or  energies  whatsoever.  But  if  this 
is  the  case,  we  must  most  certainly  revise  our  ideas  and  beliefs 
with  regard  to  the  supposed  impossibility  of  the  soul's  im- 
mortality ;  for  that  problem  at  once  assumes  a  different  and  a 
new  meaning  in  the  light  of  these  newer  facts. 

''Let  me  better  illustrate  my  meaning  by  first  quoting  from 
Professor  Shaler's  excellent  book.  The  Individual  (pp.  301-2), 
the  following  paragraph,  which  tersely  states  the  argument  of 
the  materialistic  philosopher,  and  well  illustrates  the  position 
assumed  by  the  majority  of  physicians,  psychologists,  biologists, 
physicists,  and  in  fact  by  most  scientific  men  to-day.  It  is 
this : — 

"  ' .  .  .  The  functions  of  the  body  are  but  modes  of  expression 
of  the  energy  which  it  obtains  through  the  appropriation  of  food. 
As  regards  their  origin,  these  functions  may  be  compared  to  the 
force  which  drives  the  steam  engine,  being  essentially  no  more 
mysterious  than  other  mechanical  processes.  Now,  the  mind  is 
but  one  of  the  functions  of  the  body,  a  very  specialised  work  of 


5  26  APPENDICES 

the  parts  known  as  the  nervous  system.  We  can  trace  the 
development  ot"  this  mind  in  a  tolerably  continuous  series  from 
the  lowest  stages  of  the  nervous  processes,  such  as  we  find  in 
the  Monera  or  kindred  Proto?:oa,  to  Man.  Thus  it  is  argued  that, 
though  the  mental  work  of  our  kind  is  indefinitely  more  ad- 
vanced than  that  of  the  primitive  animals,  there  is  no  good 
reason  to  believe  that  it  is  other  than  a  function  of  the  body; 
that  it  is  more  than  a  peculiar  manifestation  of  the  same  forces 
which  guide  digestion,  contract  muscles,  or  repair  a  wound. 
Furthermore,  as  is  well  known,  at  death  all  the  functions  of  the 
organic  body  fall  away  together  in  the  same  manner  and  at 
essentially  the  same  time,  so  there  is  in  fine  no  more  reason  to 
believe  that  the  functions  of  the  brain  persist  than  that  a  like 
persistence  occurs  in  the  digestive  function  or  in  the  blood- 
impelling  power  of  the  heart.  All  this,  and  much  more,  can  be 
said  to  show  that  the  phenomenon  of  death  appears  to  possess 
us  altogether  when  we  come  to  die.' 

"Now  this  position  is,  to  my  mind,  perfectly  logical.  The 
conclusion  arrived  at  is,  indeed,  the  only  one  to  which  we  can 
possibly  come — is,  in  fact,  the  actual  '  truth '  if  the  premises 
are  correct.  No !  Provided  that  these  are  true,  I  can  see  no 
possible  loophole  of  escape  for  the  logical  mind  ;  the  conclusion 
is  inevitable.  Professor  Shaler's  attempts  to  abstract  himself 
from  the  position  into  which  he  has  been  led,  and  which  he  so 
well  and  plainly  states,  are  to  me  pathetically  futile ;  it  is 
a  hopeless  failure ;  his  arguments  would,  I  think,  prove  quite 
inconclusive  to  the  critical,  scientific  thinker ;  and,  in  any  case, 
philosophic  and  metaphysical  speculations  have  no  place  what- 
ever in  a  purely  scientific  argument  of  this  kind — which  should 
deal  with  facts,  and  facts  only.^ 

^  "  Professor  John  Fiske,  indeed,  tried  to  surmount  this  difficulty — here 
presented — in  his  writings,  and  I  select  the  following  passage  as  illustra- 
tive of  his  argument.  He  says  {Life  Everlastinrj,  pp.  77-9) :' ...  If  we 
could  trace  in  detail,  the  metamorphosis  of  motions  within  the  body,  from 
the  sense  organs  to  the  brain,  and  thence  onward  to  the  muscular  system, 
it  would  be  somewhat  as  follows :  the  inward  motion,  carrying  the  message 
into  the  brain,  would  perish  in  giving  place  to  the  vibration  which  ac- 
companies the  conscious  state ;  and  this  vibration  in  turn  would  perish  in 
giving  place  to  the  outward  motion,  carrying  the  mandate  out  to  the 
muscles.  If  we  had  the  means  of  measurement  we  could  prove  the 
equivalence  from  step  to  step.  But  where  would  the  conscious  state,  the 
thought  or  feeling,  come  into  this  circuit  ?  Why,  nowhere.  The  physical 
circuit  of  motions  is  complete  in  itself  ;  the  state  of  consciousness  is  ac- 
cessible only  to  its  possessor.  To  him  it  is  the  subjective  equivalent  of 
the  vibration  within  the  brain,  whereof  it  is  neither  the  producer  nor  the 


APPENDICES  527 

"  No  :  provided  that  the  premises  are  correct,  the  conclusion 
stated  by  Professor  Shaler  is  not  only  legitimate,  but  absolutely 
incontrovertible,  and  the  conclusion  we  are  driven  to  adopt  if 
the  premises  of  the  argument  are  sound. 

"  And  now  we  perceive  the  great  significance  of  my  theory  in 
its  relation  to  the  problem  of  immortality,  and  of  its  revolu- 
tionary effects  upon  the  present-world  philosophy.  It  is  not 
only  anti-materialistic  or  negative,  but  pro-vital  and  positive  in 
its  attitude.  It  is  not  destructive,  but  constructive  ;  not  devolu- 
tionary,  but  evolutionary.  For  we  now  perceive  that  this  great 
argument  against  immortality  crumbles  to  dust ;  it  is  worse  than 
useless.  The  premises  are  not  correct;  for,  as  we  have  seen, 
nervous  or  vital  force  is  not  dependent  upon  food  combustion 
at  any  time,  nor  under  any  circumstances  whatever ;  and  con- 
sequently mental  energy — one  form  of  nervous  energy — is  not 
dependent  upon  this  physiological  process  either ;  it  is  alto- 
gether independent  of  it ;  mental  energies,  together  with  all 
other  bodily  activities,  are  quite  separate  and  distinct  from,  and 
independent  of,  this  process;  so  that,  when  the  process  itself 
ceases,  it  is  no  proof  whatever — and  there  is  not  even  a  pre- 
sumption in  favour  of  the  argument — that  mental  life  ceases  at 
the  death  of  the  physical  organism.  In  fact,  the  presumption  is 
all  the  other  way.  So  that  this  main,  oft-quoted,  and  central 
argument  against  survival  is  no  valid  objection  at  all.  Provided 
my  theory  be  true,  it  proves  to  have  no  foundation  in  fact. 
The  possibility  of  conscious  survival  of  death  is  thus  left  quite 
an  open  question — capable  of  scientific  investigation  or  of 
philosophic    dispute ;    but    the    grand,    negative   physiological 

offspring,  but  simply  the  concomitant.  In  other  words  the  natural  history 
of  the  mass  of  activities  that  are  perpetually  being  concentrated  within 
our  bodies,  to  be  presently  once  more  disintegrated  and  diffused,  shows 
us  a  closed  circle,  which  is  entirely  physical,  and  in  which  one  segment 
belongs  to  the  nervous  system.  As  for  our  conscious  life,  that  forms  no 
part  of  the  closed  circle,  but  stands  entirely  outside  of  it,  concentric  with 
the  segment  which  belongs  to  the  nervous  system.'  (See  also  in  this  con- 
nection, The  Parallelism  of  Mind  and  Body,  by  Arthur  K.  Rogers,  Ph.D., 
pp.  3-4  ;  Sir  Oliver  Lodge,  Life  and  Matter,  p.  110,  &c.).  This  theory 
is  defective,  it  seems  to  me,  in  that  it  takes  no  account  of  abstract  think- 
ing, but  only  of  sensations ;  and  we  know  that  a  man  may  sit  still  at  his 
desk  all  day  and  think,  and  yet  be  as  tired  as  though  he  had  exercised 
vigorously,  and  even  more  so.  Or  he  may  exercise  half  a  day  and  think 
half  a  day,  and  be  as  tired  as  though  he  had  done  either  one  or  other  the 
whole  day.  Obviously,  then,  thinking  does  use  up  vital  energy ;  and, 
inasmuch  as  this  energy  is  derived  from  our  food — so  it  is  claimed — the 
mental  life  must  be  directly  or  indirectly  dependent  upon  the  food  supply 
and  the  energy  derived  from  it." 


528  APPENDICES 

argument  vanishes.^     And  it  is  because  of  this  fact  that  I  think 

my  theory  not  only  of  practical  importance  to  the  physician,  but 

of  theoretical  importance  in  its  bearing  upon  human  thought ; 

upon  current  scientific  and  religious  opinion  ;  upon  the  morals 

and  the  ethics  of  the  race." 

f^  And,  as  I  contended,  at  the  end  of  the  book  (p.  580):  ".  .   . 

I    The  theory  has  tremendous  philosophic,  no  less  than  medical 

/    importance — enabling  us  to  see  that  surrounding  this  universe, 

/    and  pervading  it,  is  a  conscious  vital  energy  which  is,  in  all 

\     probability,  the  energising  force  of  the  universe,  and  which,  for 

I    want  of  a  better  name,  we  might  call  God." 


2^'// 


APPENDIX  C 

On  the  "  Creation  "  of  Life. 


It  may  be  contended  that  our  theories  of  life  and  death 
are  not  in  accord  with  the  newer  teachings  of  science,  in 
so  far  as  they  relate  to  the  recent  experiments  in  the 
creation  of  life  by  artificial  means.  Professors  Loeb,  Butler 
Burke,  Bastian,  Le  Dantec,  and  others  have  recently  been 
conducting  a  series  of  investigations  in  which  it  would 
seem  that  life  has  been  created  from  inorganic  substances, 
and,  for  that  reason,  it  may  be  said  that  it  cannot  be  the 
character  of  life  postulated  in  this  volume,  and,  con- 
sequently, that  our  theory  of  death  must  also  be  at 
fault.  If  life  can  be  brought  into  being  by  means  of 
chemical  combinations  and  compounds,  it  might  logically 
be  urged  that  it  is  closely  related  to  the  other  material 
energies,  and  by  no  means  a  force  or  energy  jper  se.     We 

1  "  I  would  point  out  in  this  connection  that,  if  this  theory  of  vitality 
be  true,  there  can  be  no  valid  objection  to  the  actual  existence — far  less 
the  investigation  of — psychic  phenomena,  because  the  objections  to  a  future 
life  would  thus  be  cleared  away,  and  the  field  left  open  for  facts.  Such 
facts  psychic  phenomena  apparently  are  ;  and  at  least  there  can  no 
longer  be  any  objection  to  their  study.  I  would  also  point  out  that  the  old 
materialistic  notion,  which  compared  the  body  to  a  lamp,  vitality  and  life 
to  the  flame,  which  simply  ceased  to  exist  with  the  extinction  of  the  lamp, 
is  thus  shown  to  be  invalid,  and  based  upon  an  incorrect  interpretation  of 
the  facts.  Life  is  not  the  result  of  any  process  of  combustion  or  oxidation 
whatever,  but,  on  the  contrary,  the  guiding,  controlling  principle — the 
real  entity,  for  whose  manifestation  the  body  was  brought  into  being." 


APPENDICES  529 

think  that  this  view  of  the  facts  is  based  upon  a  super- 
ficial examination  only.  In  the  first  place,  the  experiments 
themselves  are  largely  open  to  question.  Many  biologists 
have  never  accepted  Dr.  Bastian's  work,  and  do  not  accept 
it  to-day,  while  Dr.  Burke's  researches  are  now  all  but  uni- 
versally discredited.  Dr.  Burke  experimented  upon  radium 
and  sterilised  bouillon,  and  created,  apparently,  minute 
organisms  which  he  called  "  radiobes."  It  was  afterwards 
ascertained,  however,  that  these  organisms  could  be  dupli- 
cated without  either  radium  or  bouillon,  and  that  they 
further  lacked  all  the  essentials  of  life.  Dr.  Bastian's  experi- 
ments are  more  conclusive.  Having  placed  some  cleansed 
chemicals  and  distilled  water  in  a  sterilised  glass  flask,  he 
sealed  this  hermetically  while  steam  was  issuing  from  the 
neck,  and  then  immersed  this  flask  in  a  fluid  at  a  tem- 
perature of  260°  F.  for  twenty  minutes.  The  flask  was 
then  removed  and  stood  in  diffused  daylight  for  a  few  days. 
At  the  end  of  that  time  its  contents  was  examined,  and  it 
was  found  to  contain  bacilli  which  multiplied  and  showed 
all  the  signs  of  life.  There  are  many  imperfections  in  Dr. 
Bastian's  experiments,  and  certain  biologists  have  questioned 
whether  the  organisms  obtained  are  typical  bacilli  at  all, 
but  for  our  present  purposes  we  shall  grant  their  existence 
and  assume  that  the  experiments  are  theoretically  perfect — 
life  being  present  where  there  was  formerly  no  life. 

Now  for  the  interpretations.  It  would  usually  be  con- 
tended under  these  circumstances  that  life  had  actually 
been  created  by  the  chemical  substances  employed,  or 
through  or  by  means  of  their  combinations  and  reciprocal 
influences.  But  there  is  another  way  of  viewing  the  facts 
which  enables  us  to  hold  the  theory  of  life  herewith 
advanced,  and  to  perceive  that  there  is  no  objection  to  it 
that  can  be  urged  on  account  of  these  experiments.  Instead 
of  life  having  been  brought  into  being,  let  us  view  the  facts 
from  another  standpoint. 

Let  us  postulate  life  as  a  separate  energy  or  force  in  the 
universe.  In  order  to  become  manifest  to  us  here,  it  must 
operate  through  or  by  means  of  a  material  organism.  For 
it  to  manifest  in  this  way,  the  material  basis,  inter- 
mediary for  such  manifestation,  must  be  perfect,  the  delicate 
relations    and    inter-relations   of  all   the   particles   of   the 

2  L 


530  APPENDICES 

material  l)ody,  as  well  as  its  affinities  and  forces,  must  be 
adjusted  to  one  another  with  the  utmost  exactitude.  If 
this  perfect  balance  or  adjustment  is  not  present,  life  cannot 
manifest  through  that  material  body.  It  cannot  utilise  that 
particular  combination  of  matter  to  manifest  through.  On 
the  other  hand,  if  these  material  conditions  are  perfect,  then 
life  can  become  manifest  to  us,  because  it  can  utilise  the 
material  basis  as  a  medium  for  its  expression  or  trans- 
mission. Life,  therefore,  might  well  be  a  separate  force  or 
energy  which  only  becomes  manifest  to  us  when  such  con- 
ditions are  supplied  as  render  this  manifestation  possible. 


APPENDIX   D 

Mrs.  Piper^s  Trance  State. 

A  NOTE  on  Mrs.  Piper's  trance  condition  may  be  of  in- 
terest in  this  connection.  Mrs.  Piper  passes  into  trance 
somewhat  in  this  fashion:  She  seats  herself  upon  a  chair, 
remains  passive,  fixes  her  eyes  upon  some  point  in  space  or 
upon  the  opposite  wall,  and  within  five  or  ten  minutes 
slowly  passes  into  the  trance  state.  Her  breathing  becomes 
stertorous,  the  eyes  assume  a  look  of  vacancy ;  gradually 
the  head  droops,  the  body  becomes  limp,  sags  forward,  and 
is  supported  upon  the  cushions  piled  upon  the  table  to 
receive  it.  The  coming-out  of  the  trance  condition  is  most 
interesting  to  watch,  and  no  one  who  has  witnessed  it  can 
well  doubt  the  genuine  nature  of  the  trance  state.  From 
fifteen  to  twenty  minutes  is  frequently  required  to  regain 
full  consciousness  and  possession  of  the  faculties,  and 
frequently  the  mind  is  not  clear  for  an  hour  or  so  after 
apparently  normal  conditions  have  been  restored.  In  coming 
out  of  the  trance  the  hand  first  drops  the  pencil  with  which 
the  automatic  writing  has  been  done,  then  pushes  away  the 
articles  ("  influences  ")  that  have  been  presented  to  it.  A 
few  moments  of  passivity  then  follow.  Soon  a  general 
writhing  movement  of  the  body  is  noted,  accompanied  by 
groans,  semi-articulate  exclamations,  and  movements  of  the 
hands  and  arms.      The  head  is  then  raised  and  the  face 


APPENDICES  531 

can  be  seen  to  be  perfectly  expressionless.  The  eyes  are 
generally  open  and  staring  into  vacancy.  In  this  state 
words  and  fragments  of  sentences  are  muttered,  which 
can  be  caught  by  placing  the  ear  close  to  the  mouth. 
These  fragmentary  remarks  are  frequently  of  great  interest 
and  importance,  and  supernormal  information,  such  as 
names,  &c.,  have  been  obtained  at  this  time,  which  had 
been  sought  in  vain  during  the  regular  trance  state.  What 
apparently  happens,  and  what  the  controls  say  does  happen, 
is  that  Mrs.  Piper's  "  soul  "  is  taken  out  of  her  body  and  set 
to  one  side,  while  other  entities  manipulate  her  organism, 
during  the  trance !  That  is  what  the  appearances  suggest. 
The  trance  is  certainly  genuine.  In  the  early  years  of 
the  Society's  work,  Mrs.  Piper  was  carefully  tested  for 
anaesthesia  and  various  reactions.  It  was  found  that  the 
eyes  reacted  slightly  to  light,  that  her  pulse  was  affected, 
and  that  there  was,  sometimes  at  least,  complete  insensibility 
to  pain.  In  later  years,  since  the  control  has  changed, 
the  trance  has  become  much  deeper,  and  there  is  now  no 
sensibility  such  as  existed  formerly,  though  no  severe  pain 
tests  have  been  tried  of  late. 


APPENDIX   E 

Superstitions,  Sayings,  ^c,  concerning  Death. 

"  Superstitions,   Sayings,  &c.,   concerning   Death,"  by  C. 
W.  J.,  in  Chambers  Book  of  Days,  vol.  ii.,  pp.  52-53: — 

"  If  a  grave  is  open  on  Sunday,  there  will  be  another  dug  in 
a  week. 

"  This  I  believe  to  be  a  very  narrowly  limited  superstition, 
as  Sunday  is  generally  a  favourite  day  of  funerals  among  the 
poor. 

"  If  a  corpse  does  not  stiffen  after  death,  or  if  the  rigor  mortis 
disappears  before  burial,  it  is  a  sign  that  there  will  be  a  death 
in  the  family  before  the  end  of  the  year. 

"  In  the  case  of  a  child  of  my  own,  every  joint  of  the  corpse 
was  as  flexible  as  in  life.  I  was  perplexed  at  this,  thinking  that 
perhaps  the  little  fellow  might,  after  all,  be  in  a  trance.     While 


532  APPENDICES 

I  was  considering  the  matter,  I  perceived  a  bystander  looking 
very  grave  and  evidently  having  something  on  her  mind.  On 
asking  her  what  she  wished  to  say,  I  received  for  an  answer 
that,  though  she  did  not  put  any  faith  in  it  herself,  yet  people 
did  say  that  such  a  thing  was  a  sign  of  another  death  in  the 
family  within  the  twelvemonth. 

"  If  every  remnant  of  Christmas  decoration  is  not  cleared  out 
of  church  before  Candlemas  Day  (February  2),  there  will  be  a 
death  that  year  in  the  family  occupying  the  pew  where  a  leaf 
or  berry  is  left. 

"  An  old  lady  (now  dead)  whom  I  knew  was  so  persuaded  of 
the  truth  of  this  superstition  that  she  would  not  be  content  to 
leave  the  clearing  of  her  pew  to  the  constituted  authorities,  but 
used  to  send  her  own  servant  on  Candlemas  Eve  to  see  that  her 
own  seat,  at  any  rate,  was  thoroughly  freed  from  danger. 

"Fires  and  candles  also  afford  presages  of  death  —  coffins 
flying  out  of  the  former,  and  winding-sheets  guttering  down 
from  the  latter.  A  winding-sheet  is  produced  from  a  candle ; 
if,  after  it  has  guttered,  the  strip  which  has  run  down,  instead 
of  being  absorbed  into  the  general  tallow,  remains  unmelted ; 
if,  under  these  circumstances,  it  curls  over  away  from  the  flame, 
it  is  a  presage  of  death  to  the  person  in  whose  direction  it  points. 

"  Coffins  out  of  the  fire  are  hollow,  oblong  cinders,  spirited 
from  it,  and  are  a  sign  of  coming  death  in  the  family.  I  have 
seen  cinders  which  have  flown  out  of  the  fire  picked  up  and 
examined  to  see  what  they  presaged  ;  for  coffins  are  not  the  only 
things  that  are  thus  produced.  If  the  cinder,  instead  of  being 
oblong,  is  oval,  it  is  a  cradle,  and  predicts  the  advent  of  a  baby ; 
while,  if  it  is  round,  it  is  a  purse,  and  means  prosperity. 

"  The  howling  of  a  dog  at  night  under  the  window  of  a  sick- 
room is  looked  upon  as  a  warning  of  death  being  near. 

"Perhaps  there  may  be  some  truth  in  this  notion.  Every- 
body knows  the  peculiar  odour  which  frequently  precedes  death, 
and  it  is  possible  that  the  acute  nose  of  the  dog  may  perceive 
this,  and  that  it  may  render  him  uneasy ;  but  the  same  can 
hardly  be  alleged  in  favour  of  the  notion  that  the  screech  of  an 
owl  flying  past  signifies  the  same,  for  if  the  owl  did  scent  death 
and  was  in  hopes  of  prey,  it  is  not  likely  that  it  would  screech 
and  so  give  notice  of  its  presence." 


APPENDICES  533 

APPENDIX   F 

The  Death  of  Cells. 
From  Age,  Growth,  and  Death,  by  C.  S.  Minot,  pp.  75-76  : — 

I.  Death  of  Cells. 

1.   Causes  of  Death. 

A.  External  to  the  organism  : — 

1.  Physical  (mechanical,  chemical,  thermal,  ifec). 

2.  Parasites. 

B.  Changes  in   intercellular  substances  (probably  primaiily 
due  to  cells) : — 

1.  Hypertrophy. 

2.  Induration. 

3.  Calcification. 

4.  Amyloid  degeneration  (infiltration). 

C.  Changes  inherent  in  cells. 

2.  Morphological  Changes  of  Dying  Cells. 

A,  Direct  death  of  cells  : — 

1.  Atrophy. 

2.  Disintegration  and  reabsorption. 

B.  Indirect  death  of  cells  : — 

1.  Necrobiosis  (structural  change  precedes  final  death). 

2.  Hypertrophic  degeneration  (growth  and  structural  change 

often  with  nuclear  proliferation  precede  final  death). 

3.  Removal  of  Cells. 

A.  By  mechanical  means  (sloughing  or  shedding). 

B.  By  chemical  means  (solution). 

C.  By  phagocytes. 

II.  Indirect  Death  of  Cells. 

A.  Necrobiosis: — 

1.  Cytoplasmic  changes — 
(a)  Granulation. 
{h)   Hyaline  transformation, 
(c)    Imbibition. 
{d)  Desiccation, 
(e)    Clasmatosis. 


534  APPENDICES 

2.  Nuclear  changes — 

(a)  Karyorhexis. 

(b)  Karyolysis. 

B.  Hypertrophic  degeneration  : — 

1.  Cytoplasmic — 

(a)  Granular. 

(b)  Cornifying. 

(c)  Hyaline. 

2.  Paraplasmic — 

(a)  Fatty. 

(b)  Pigmentary. 

(c)  Mucoid. 
{(l)  Colloid,  &c. 

3.  Nuclear  (increase  of  chromatin). 


APPENDIX   G 

Eusapia  Pallad'md' s  Phenomena  and  Fraud. 

It  may  be  thought  that  we  have,  in  our  discussion  of  the 
evidence  in  this  case,  ignored  the  fraud  that  was  brought  to 
light  during  the  American  investigation,  and  which,  in  the 
estimation  of  a  large  proportion  of  the  American  public  at 
least,  deprives  the  case  of  evidential  value.  We  wish  to  state 
most  emphatically,  however,  that  such  is  not  the  case,  and  that 
we  have  given  due  weight  to  this  negative  evidence  in  summing 
up  the  results.  In  spite  of  the  fraud  which  has  been  discovered, 
we  do  not  feel  in  the  least  inclined  to  alter  our  former  opinion, 
and  for  the  following  reasons : — For  more  than  twenty  years,  it 
has  been  known  that  Eusapia  Palladino  resorts  to  trickery  when- 
ever possible  ;  all  her  European  investigators  knew  this,  and 
have  caught  her  repeatedly.  We  ourselves  detected  fraud,  or 
attempts  at  fraud,  on  several  occasions.  In  spite  of  this,  how- 
ever, no  one  who  has  studied  her  case  for  any  length  of  time 
has  failed  to  be  convinced  that  genuine  supernormal  manifesta- 
tions are  witnessed  in  her  presence  ;  and  the  longer  they  study 
her,  the  more  certain  are  they  that  fraud  cannot  account  for 
many  of  the  observed  facts.  Under  certain  conditions,  Eusapia 
can  produce  phenomena  which  are  unquestionably  genuine  ;  but 


APPENDICES  535 

if  those  conditions  are  lacking,  and  the  medium,  for  any  reason, 
cannot  succeed,  she  invariably  resorts  to  trickery,  rather  than 
admit  that  she  is  unable  to  produce  them.  Particularly  has 
this  been  the  case  of  late  years,  as  her  powers  have  gradually 
waned,  and  increasing  difficulty  has  been  experienced  by  the 
medium  in  obtaining  any  phenomena  at  all ;  or  phenomena  of 
so  feeble  a  character  that  no  man  of  common  sense  could  expect 
to  be  convinced  by  them.  But  the  genuine  phenomena  are 
undoubted.  No  one  who  has  attended  a  really  good  seance  can 
doubt  this.  And  the  fraudulent  phenomena  are  a  very  weak 
imitation  of  the  genuine  manifestations,  which  frequently  take 
place  in  light  sufficiently  good  to  enable  the  sitters  to  see  clearly 
that  the  medium  is  not  producing  the  phenomena  herself. 
While,  therefore,  we  acknowledge  that  Eusapia  practised  fraud, 
and  probably  a  good  deal  of  fraud,  during  her  later  American 
seances,  we  still  deny  that  this  in  any  way  proves  that  her 
earlier  phenomena  were  also  fraudulent.  We  admit  her  trickery  ; 
but  then,  everybody  who  had  studied  the  case  already  knew 
that  she  tricked,  and  no  new  form  of  trickery  was  disclosed 
by  the  American  series.  We  feel,  therefore,  and  feel  strongly, 
that,  in  spite  of  the  fraud  disclosed,  the  case  as  a  whole  remains 
in  statu  quo ;  and  that  the  evidence  has  not  been  materially 
shaken.  Indeed,  a  great  mass  of  material  evidencing  the 
supernormal  has  been  presented  at  these  seances,  for  the 
details  of  which  we  refer  the  reader  to  the  Annals  of  Psychical 
Science,  1910-11. 


APPENDIX  H 

Dr.  Tan7ier's  "  Studies  in  S'piritis'm,^^  and  Survival. 

While  our  book  was  passing  through  the  press.  Dr.  Amy  E. 
Tanner's  important  work,  Studies  in  Spiritism,  was  issued.  It 
gives  an  account  of  a  short  series  of  sittings,  by  herself  and  Dr. 
Stanley  Hall,  with  Mrs.  Piper,  and  incidentally  discusses  the 
evidence  for  survival,  and  for  supernormally-acquired  informa- 
tion, not  only  in  the  Piper  case,  but  by  means  of  telepathy, 
clairvoyance,  &c.  The  book  attempts  to  show  that  the  whole 
of  the  evidence  for  survival  is  groundless,  and  that  telepathy, 
clairvoyance,  and  spirit- communication  are  believed  in  only 
because  of  inexact  analysis  of  the  evidence.  The  case  is  most 
forcibly  presented  in  her  book,  and  it  is  certainly  an  epoch- 


536  APPENDICES 

making  work  in  the  history  of  psychical  research.  Dr.  Tanner 
attempts  to  show  that  experimental  thought-transference  can 
be  explained  by  a  combination  of  hypersesthesia,  chance-coin- 
cidence, and  by  that  parallelism  or  similarity  of  thought  which 
is  so  common  to  all  individuals  living  in  the  same  commu- 
nity, and  in  much  the  same  environment.  Apparitions  at  the 
moment  of  death  are  examined,  and  deemed  to  be  due  to 
chance-coincidence  and  other  normal  causes.  The  entire  evi- 
dence for  the  supernormal  is  considered  and  dealt  with  in  a 
similar  way. 

It  would  be  impossible,  in  the  limited  time  and  space  at  our 
disposal,  adequately  to  consider  or  discuss  this  book,  and  its 
attempted  reduction  of  psychical  research  to  "rationalism." 
The  attack  on  the  Piper  case  most  intimately  concerns  us ;  and 
it  may  be  said  at  once  that  we  consider  much  of  this  destructive 
evidence — particularly  of  the  cross-correspondences — wholesome 
and  sound.  Her  facts  and  arguments  are,  indeed,  in  many  cases 
convincing.  Thus,  it  is  evident  that  when  a  fictitious  person- 
ality is  suggested  to  the  "  controls,"  and  when  this  personality 
— which  never  had  any  existence,  except  in  the  minds  of  the 
experimenters — turns  up  and  "  communicates,"  giving  lengthy 
descriptions  of  his  own  life,  and  recalling  many  incidents  which 
never  in  reality  took  place  at  all,  it  is  evident  that  no  such 
personality  really  existed  ;  but  that  it  was  probably  a  portion 
of  Mrs.  Piper's  subliminal  consciousness,  acting  out  the  part  it 
is  supposed  to  play.  This  does  not  mean  that  Mrs.  Piper  is 
consciously  fraudulent;  and  both  Dr.  Tanner  and  Dr.  Hall 
state  their  complete  faith  in  the  medium's  honesty.  But  it 
does  seem  to  imply  that  portions  of  the  medium's  mind  may 
assume  the  guise  of  "  spirits,"  and  pass  themselves  off  as 
"  spirits,"  whereas,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  they  are  not  spirits  at 
all,  but,  as  before  said,  mere  portions  of  the  medium's  own  mind. 
Good  evidence  is  advanced,  also,  in  proof  of  the  contention  that 
Hodgson  is  not  Hodgson — at  least  the  Hodgson  whom  we  once 
knew — but  is  some  masquerading  intelligence,  again  a  mere 
fragment  of  the  medium's  subconsciousness,  or  some  external 
and  mischievously-inclined  intelligence,  palming  itself  off  as 
Dr.  Hodgson,  and  wilfully  pretending  to  be  he.  [This  is,  we 
may  say,  the  belief  of  some  psychical  researchers,  who  admit 
the  mere  facts.]  But  the  general  conclusion  seems  fair,  that 
the  soi-disant  "  spirits  "  were  not,  in  these  sittings,  what  they 
purported  to  be,  and,  that  being  so,  it  is  possible,  even  probable, 
some  may  think,  that  they  were  not  "spirits"  in  other  cases 
either. 


APPENDICES  537 

Theoretically,  the  argument  is  perfect,  and  it  would  take 
much  space  to  show  why  it  is  not  so  actually.  As  briefly  as 
possible,  however,  we  believe  that  the  case  is  not  closed — the 
whole  of  the  evidence  is  not  shown  to  be  due  to  normal  causes, 
for  the  following  reasons  : — 

1.  Adequate  allowance  is  not  made  for  the  supernormal 
knowledge  shown.  Assuming,  for  the  sake  of  argument,  that 
the  personalities  in  the  Piper  case  are  not  "  spirits,"  in  the 
sense  that  they  are  usually  thought  to  be,  that  does  not  prove 
that  no  supernormal  knowledge  is  displayed ;  or  even  that 
Spiritism  may  not  ultimately  be  true.  Professor  James  always 
took  the  stand  that  Rector,  Imperator,  &c.,  were  mere  "  per- 
sonifications"  by  Mrs.  Piper,  and  that  R.  H.  was  not  really 
present  every  time  the  hand  wrote,  "Here  I  am,  R.  H. — 
How  are  you  ? "  &c.  He  always  assumed  that  this  was  sub- 
conscious acting  on  the  part  of  Mrs.  Piper ;  yet,  in  spite  of 
this,  he  believed  that  "  dips  down "  from  a  spiritual  world 
frequently  occurred,  and  that  the  actual  germ  of  knowledge 
displayed  emanated  from  the  intelligence  it  claimed  to  issue 
from.  It  was  merely  symbolised  and  dramatised  and  elabo- 
rated by  the  medium's  subliminal,  just  as  dreams  are  elaborated 
and  extended  from  actual,  external  stimuli.  In  both  cases,  the 
stimuli  actually  exist ;  but  they  are  not  recognised  in  the  mass 
of  symbolism  and  elaborate  detail  with  which  they  were  clothed 
before  they  emerged  into  consciousness.  Thus,  a  spiritual  world 
might  well  exist,  and  information  be  imparted  therefrom,  but 
it  would  have  to  come  through  the  medium's  mind  and  organ- 
ism, and  be  enacted  and  personified  by  it.  But  the  destruction 
of  the  "  psychological  burning-glass  "  would  not  annihilate  the 
sun  ;  the  vehicle  might  be  destroyed,  but  the  reality  remain 
behind,  unmanifest. 

2.  The  method  adopted  in  the  book  of  disposing  of  the  super- 
normal evidence  in  the  Piper  case  is  by  no  means  conclusive  to 
us.  It  is  impossible  to  reduce  to  figures  psychological  facts  of 
this  character ;  and  Dr.  Tanner  should  know  that.  Due  allow- 
ance is  not  made  for  the  "  personal  factor" ;  much  of  the  best 
evidence  for  survival  is  of  so  private  a  nature  that  it  has  not 
been  and  never  can  be  published ;  and  Dr.  Tanner  begins  by 
ruling  this  all  out  as  non-evidential,  because  not  printed  !  This 
is  hardly  fair  treatment  of  the  evidence,  and  this  method  of 
disposing  of  valuable  material  in  too  offhand  a  manner  appears 
to  us  to  have  been  applied  too  freely  in  the  work  under  review. 
We  expect  to  see  this  portion  of  her  book  disproved  and  shown 
to  be  unjustifiable,  by  later  researches.     Certainly  there  are, 


538  APPENDICES 

in  our  estimation,  many  hundreds  of  incidents  in  the  Piper  and 
other  similar  cases,  which  have  not  been  adequately  accounted 
for  in  the  book  under  review. 

3.  The  attempts  to  show  that  "  Dr.  Hodgson  "  and  Mrs.  Piper 
are  possessed  of  a  common  memory  and  common  emotional 
background  are,  to  us,  quite  inconclusive,  and  display  as  great 
a  "  selective  capacity  "  in  the  mind  of  the  writer,  forcing  her  to 
pick  out  only  those  facts  which  it  wanted  to  see  hidden  in  the 
material,  as  Mr.  Piddington's  mind  could  be  accused  of  dis- 
playing, in  his  selection  of  the  cross-correspondence  tests !  Dr. 
Tanner  asserts  that  "  a  memory  common  to  the  two  person- 
alities "  is  proved  by  these  observations  (p.  22).  Four  incidents 
are  quoted  in  support  of  this  view  : — 

(1)  The  "control"  asked  for  more  air,  as  the  room  was 
"  stuffy " ;  and  this  was  taken  to  indicate  that  Mrs.  Piper's 
subconscious  mind  requested  it,  as  she  is  known  to  be  very 
sensitive  to  closeness,  &c.  Yet  Dr.  Hodgson,  when  alive,  knew 
the  value  of  fresh  air  during  the  sittings,  and  always  insisted 
upon  it ;  hence,  if  he  reacted  to  the  bodily  condition  of  the 
medium  at  all,  he  might  have  requested  this. 

(2)  Dr.  Tanner  pretended  that  gas  was  leaking  in  the  hall ; 
and  the  hand  at  once  wrote  that  "  anything  wrong  was  to  be 
attended  to  at  once."  From  this  fact  Dr.  Tanner  draws  the 
conclusion  that  Mrs.  Piper,  and  not  the  control,  did  the  writing. 
Why,  it  is  hard  to  see,  inasmuch  as  the  "controls"  have  always 
been  solicitous  regarding  her  health  and  comfort  during  the 
trance  state.  We  fail  to  see  in  this  the  slightest  evidence  that 
Mrs.  Piper  herself  was  doing  the  thinking  or  writing. 

(3)  The  "control"  was  asked  if  some  "pain-tests"  might  be 
tried  ;  and  the  control  stated  that  she  (the  medium)  would  not 
feel  the  pain,  but  that  "  they  had  better  not  try  them,"  as  "  the 
machine  might  suffer  after  the  sitting  had  ended."  Again, 
Dr.  Tanner  draws  the  conclusion  that  "  a  memory  common  to 
the  two  personalities  "  is  proved  by  this  fact.  We  fail  to  see 
the  slightest  reason  for  thinking  so. 

(4)  The  strongest  evidence  for  this  "  common  memory,"  in 
Dr.  Tanner's  estimation,  is  furnished  by  the  following  incident : 
"  Dr.  Hall,  before  the  trance,  quoted  the  phrase,  *  a  white 
blackbird,'  to  Mrs.  Piper,  and  in  the  trance  Hodgson  used  the 
phrase,  '  Catch  me,  and  you  catch  a  white  crow.' " 

From  this  fact  Dr.  Tanner  concludes  that  there  is  a  "  com- 
mon memory  "  in  the  two  cases,  because  a  remark  uttered  in 
Mrs.  Piper's  presence  comes  out  in  the  trance,  as  if  from  Dr. 
Hodgson.     But  it  is  dangerous  for  a  critic,  however  acute  he 


APPENDICES  539 

(or  she)  may  be,  to  draw  large  conclusions  from  scarce  data ; 
and  this  is  well  shown  in  the  present  instance.  For,  in  this 
case,  there  is  no  evidence  that  the  remark  was  "  carried  over," 
into  the  trance ;  on  the  other  hand,  there  is  good  reason  to 
believe  that  it  originated  in  Dr.  Hodgson.  And  for  the 
following  reason  : — 

In  a  sitting  which  one  of  us  had  with  Mrs.  Piper  in  January 
1908,  the  following  conversation  occurred  : — 

(You  won't  forget  that  message  you  promised  to  give  me 
through  another  light,  will  you  ?) 

Not  much.  Catch  me  to  forget,  and  you'll  catch  a  white 
blackbird. 

(White  blackbird?  Do  you  remember  Professor  James's 
joke  about  that?) 

Of  course  I  do ;  you  mean  croic. 

(Yes.) 

Do  you  mean  as  applied  to  this?  [the  medium]. 

(Yes.) 

Oh  yes,  blackbird  I  said  just  for  fun.  Well,  Carrington,  old 
chap,  I'm  glad  to  know  you  .  .   .  cfec. 

It  will  be  seen  that  Dr.  Hodgson  and  the  sitter  had  discussed 
this  "  white  crow  "  incident  in  a  sitting  which  has  never  been 
published,  but  which  took  place  January  13,  1908.  Dr.  Tanner 
did  not  have  her  sittings  until  more  than  a  year  later.  It  is 
very  evident,  therefore,  that  the  "white  blackbird"  incident, 
which  is  supposed  to  indicate  more  strongly  than  any  other  the 
bond  of  connection  between  Dr.  Hodgson's  memory  and  that  of 
Mrs.  Piper,  is  evidentially  worthless,  and  open  to  quite  another 
interpretation. 

We  have  said  enough,  at  all  events,  to  show  the  reader  that 
the  book  here  under  review,  while  possessing  many  fine 
qualities,  yet  fails  to  explain  or  take  into  account  many  factors, 
and  unduly  slights  much  supernormal  information  which  has 
been  given  from  time  to  time  in  the  past,  through  Mrs.  Piper. 
For  this  reason  we  believe  that  the  book,  despite  its  excellence, 
will  not  have  the  effect  which  the  authors  doubtless  believe  it 
should  have — viz.,  of  arresting,  to  a  great  extent,  the  growth  of 
spiritualism ;  inasmuch  as  they  fail  to  explain  much  of  the 
strongest  evidence  in  favour  of  the  survival  or  persistence  of 
human  consciousness  after  death.  (For  a  detailed  reply  to 
Dr.  Tanner's  book,  see  Journal  of  the  American  S.PM.,  Jan., 
1911,  pp.  1-98.) 


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this  character. 

540 


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PERIODICALS 

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INDEX 


Abbott,  David  P.,  396,  397-400 

Accordion  test,  410-11 

Adare,  Lord,  409 

Addison,  275 

Aggazzotti,  Dr.  A.,  417-19 

Air,  capacity  of  lungs  for,  378-79 

Alden,  H.  M.,  263 

Alger,  262,  281-82,  289-90 

Allen,  Dr.  Thomas  T.,  214 

American  seances  of  Eusapia  Palla- 

dino,  430  36,  534-35 
Anaesthesia  and  death,  similarities 

of,  310-13 
Ancestor  worship,  238-40 
Angell,  George  T.,  67 
Apparitions,  coincidental,  382-84 

experimental,  335-43 

Arullani,  Dr.,  418-19 
Asphyxia,  death  by,  119-20 
Audouard,  M.,  89 
Aura,  after  death,  27-28 
Automatic  writing,   during   death, 

307 

Bacon,  Lord,  262 

Baggally,  W.  W.,  421,  424-30 

Baraduc,  Dr.  H.,  174,  356,  358,  359, 

367-71,  372 
Barucha,  Edward,  243-44 
Bastian,  Dr.  H.  Charlton,  217-18, 

528  29 
Bates,  Miss  Katharine,  182-84 
Beaumont,  Dr.,  103 
Beecher,  Henry  Ward,  300 
Bennett,  Edward  T.,  360 
Besant,  Mrs.  Annie,  85 
Bibliography,  540 
Bichat,  100,  135 
Bishop,  Washington  Irving,  61 
Black  light,  371 
Blake,  Mrs.,  397-400 
Book  of  Judgment,  317 
Bordas,  M.,  36 


Bostwick,  Dr.  Homer,  15,  136,  157 
Bouchut,  Dr.,  63-64 
Bozzano,  Dr.  Ernesto,  178-79,327 
Braid,  Dr.  James,  44,  46 
Brittain,  Emma  Hardinge,  250 
Brouardel,  Dr.,   18,  19,    21,  22,   24, 

33,  38,  39,  40,  41-42,  92,  93,  96, 

187-88 
Broussais,  Dr.,  103,  106 
Brown-Sequard,  Dr.,  34,  35 
Biihler,  Dr.,  134 
Burial  customs,  77-82 
Burke,    Dr.    John    Butler,     170-72, 

528-29 
Burns  and  scalds,  death  from,  96 
Bute,  Marquis  of,  445 
Butler,  Bishop,  282-83,  286,  287,  290 

Calkins,  G.  N.,  10 

Calmet,  Augustine,  520-22 

Cannibalism,  origin  of,  239 

Cardiac  massage,  122 

Carus,  Dr.  Paul,  175-77 

Catalepsy,  defined,  45,  51-52 

Cazanvieilh,  138 

Cells,  cause  of  death  of,  533-34 

Chaldeans,  beliefs  of,  243 

Chase,  Prof.,  261,  286 

Chenoworth,  Mrs.,  499 

Christ,  raisingf  rom  the  dead,  288-89 

Christians,  early  beliefs  of,  248 

Cicero,  247,  263 

Clairvoyance,  439-42 

Clark,  Dr.  Ed.  H.,  300,  318-19 

Claughton,  Mrs.,  445-48 

Cobb,  Augustus  G. ,  83,  85 

Communications,  confusion  in,  508- 

516 
Conclusions,  517-18 
Conditional  immortality,  260 
Confucius,  23'.'-40 
Confusion  in  communications,  508- 

516 


54 


INDEX 


549 


Conn,  H.  W.,  233 

Consciousness,     its      relation      to 

organism,  312-13,  313-14 
Consciousness,  as  a  function  of  the 

organism,  4r)7-58 
Cremation,  82-85 
Crookes,  Sir  William,  409,  410-11 
Curry,  Dr.  James,  53 
Cutter,  James  E. ,  123 
Cuvier,  4 

D'Albe,  Fournier,  231 

Dana,  Dr.  C.  L,  46-47 

Darwin,  Charles,  55-56,  442,  454 

Davis,  Andrew  Jackson,  205,  328- 

334,  348 
Davis,  Dr.  N.  E.,  118 
Davis,  Mary  F.,  332 
Davis,  W.  S.,  431 
Death,    various    kinds    of,    11-13, 

215-17 

conscious,  12 

somatic,  12 

Delirium,  statements  made  during, 

514 
Dematerialisation  of  matter,  358-59 
De  Morgan,  Prof.,  439-41 
De  Quincey,  310-17 
Desmond,  Countess  of,  14 
Dessoir,  Prof.  Max,  167-68 
Diamond,  Captain,  case  of,  16 
DiflSculties  in  communication,  508- 

516 
Dixwell,  Dr.  John,  69 
Donnet,  Archbishop,  62-63 
Draper,  Henry,  287 
Dreams,  nature  of,  50 
Driscoll,  Dr.  James  F.,  168-69 
Drowning,  death  by,  119-20 
Druids,  beliefs  of,  245 
Drummond,  Prof.  Henry,  260 
Dubois,  Prof.  Paul,  211,  218,  221-22 
Ductless   glands,    degeneration   of, 

as  a  cause  of  old  age,  153-54 

Ecstasy,  defined,  45 
Edmunds,  Judge,  352 
Egyptians,  beliefs  of,  240 
Elbe,  L.,  242,  244,  247,  279-81 
Electricity,  death  by,  122-25 
Embalming,  process  of,  85-88 
Emerson,  R.  W.,  259 
Energy  and  matter,  358-59 
Erskine,  Ebenezer,  61,  62 


Esdaile,  Dr.,  48,  49 
Evans,  Dr.  De  Lacy,  15,  136,  157 
Evidence  of  survival,  535-39 
Experimental  apparitions,  335-43 
Eye,  pictures  in,  after  death,  20 

Fakirs  of  India,  52 

Falling,  sensations  while,  315-16 

Fancher,  Molly,  204 

Faunce,  Pres. ,  207-8 

Feigning  death,  55-56 

Feilding,  Hon.  Everard,  421,  424- 

430,  435 
Ferrier,  Dr.,  445,  447 
Finch,  Mrs.  Laura  I.,  180-82 
Finot,  Jean,  16,  84-85,  224-25,  301 
Fiske,  John,  527 

Flammarion,  Camille,  384,  385,  387 
Fletcher,  Dr.  Moore  R.,  71 
Fletcher,  Horace,  163 
¥oh,  Dr.  Charles,  417-19 

,  Prof.  P.,  417-19 

Freezing,  death  by,  115-17 
French,  Mrs.  Emily  S,,  case  of,  401 
Fruitarianism,  156-57 
Funk,  Dr.  Isaac  K.,  341,  343,  401 

Garland,  Hamlin,  401-6 

Garrigues,  Dr.  Henry,  67-69 

Gates,  Dr.  Elmer,  26-27 

Gauls,  beliefs  of,  244-45 

Gaze,  Henry.  130,  214-15,  221 

Glardon,  Auguste,  388 

God,  conception  of,  528 

Goethe,  339 

Good,  Dr.,  101 

Gowers,  Dr.  W.  R. ,  53 

Graham,  Dr.  Sylvester,  220 

Greeks,  beliefs  of,  j:45-47 

Gregory,  Dr.,  130,  220 

Griffiths,  Dr.,  110,  111 

Guen,  M.  le,  71 

Gurney,  Edmund,  836,  338,  339,  390 

Haeckel,  Ernst,  9,  10, 172  74,  209 

Haemorrhage,  death  by,  90-98 

Hair,  blanching  of,  141 

Hall,  Dr.  G.  Stanley,  535 

Haller,  101 

Hallucination    theory    of    physical 

phenomena,  412 
Hallucinations,  census  of,  383 
Hamilton,  Gail,  306 
Hamilton,  Sir  William,  438 


550 


INDEX 


Hammond,  Dr  William  A.,  47,  130, 

214,  256,  2<U,  276 
Hands,  materialised.  411 
Hannah  Wild,  letter,  472-75 
Harrison,  Dr.,  97 
Hartmann,  Dr.  Franz,    20,  24,  52, 

58,  (14,  66,  67,  72,  o21-22 
Hartmann,  M.,  11 
Harvey,  34 

Haunted  Houses,  448-54 
Haunting,  theories  of,  452-54 
Hegel,  260 
Heim.  Dr.,  31.'. 
Heredity,  219 
Herlitzka,  Dr.  A.,  417-19 
Hesiod,  246 

Hindus,  beliefs  of,  242-43 
Hodgson,  Dr.  Richard,  323-26,346, 

353,  470-72,  475-80,  510 
Holland,  Mrs.,  493 
Holmes,  Prof.  S.  J.,  55-50 
Home,  D.  D.,  case  of,  408-12 
Hudson,  T.  J.,  52,  27 1-72,  276,  277, 

340,  341 
Hunter,  John,  102 
Huxley,  Thomas,  4 
Hyslop,  James  H.,  101,  304-5,319- 

326,  341,  342,  343.  353,  472-75, 

481-91,  499-500,  510-15 

Insanity,  theory  of,  205-6 
Isham,  Dr.  A.  B.,  28,  29,  30,  31 

Jacobs,  Joseph,  160 

Jaffa,  Prof.,  156 

James,  Dr.  J.  Brindley,  47,  48 

James,  Prof.  William,  45,  210,  278, 

469-70,  497,  498 
Jastrow,  Prof.  Joseph,  437 
Jelliffe,  Dr.  Smith  Ely,  112 
Jencken,  H.  D.,  411 
Jenkins,  Henry,  case  of,  14 
Jews,  beliefs  of,  240-42 
Johnson,  Alice,  385-86,  412 

Kant,  201 
Keeler,  Mrs.,  499 
Kellogg,  Dr.  J.  H.,  188 
Knott,  Dr  John,  125 
Krafft-Ebing,  Dr.,  212 
Kuhne,  Dr.,  20,  34 

Lang,  Andrew,  337,  414,  445,  499- 
COO 


Langley,  Prof.  S.  P.,  284-85 

Last  words  of  distinguished  men, 

308-9 
Lateau,  Louise,  case  of,  213 
Laws  of  nature,  284-85 
Leaf,    Dr.    Walter,    184-86,    459. 

467-70 
Le  Bon,  Dr.  Gustave,  208,  350,  359, 

371 
Le  Conte,  Prof.  Joseph,  158-59 
Le  Dantec.  Prof.,  528 
Lee,  General,  case  of,  61 
Lenormand,  Dr.  L.,  71 
Lewes,  G.  H.,  130 
Life,  definition  of,  3,  4,  5,  6,  194. 

524-25,  527-28 

creation  of,  528-30 

Lightning,  death  by,  122-25 
Livingstone,  Dr.  David,  301-2 
Locke,  261 
Lodge,  Sir  Oliver,  357,  459,  460- 

461,  461-67,  498-99 
Loeb,  Prof.  Jacques,  233,  528 
Lombroso,  Prof.,  435 
Londe,  Charles,  53 
Longevity,  human,  13-16 
Lorand,  Dr.  Arnold,  152-54 
Lotze,  260 

M'Clintock,  265-66 

M'Connell.  260 

M'Dougall,    Dr.    Duncan,    372-78, 

379,  380 
M'Lagan,  Sir  Douglas,  94 
Malcolm,  Dr.  John  D.,  96,  135 
Mapes,  Prof.,  411 
Marsh,  H.  P.   297-98 
Marvin,  Dr.,  47 

Materialism,  theory  of,  457-58 
Materialisation,  358-59 
Matter  and  energy,  358,  359 
Maupas,  E.,  10 
Maxwell,  Dr.  J.,  407-8 
M(5gnin,  M.,  90 
Melville,  Rear-Admiral  George  N., 

380 
Mental  causes  of  death,  98-109 
Mental  life  and  bodily  energy,  524- 

528 
Mental  phenomena,  437 
Metchnikoff,  Elie,  16, 129,  131,  132, 

133-34,  141,  144,  154,  155,  157, 

160 
Mills,  Dr.  Charles  E.,  45 


INDEX 


551 


Mills,  Prof.  Wesley,  233 

Minot,   Prof.   Charles   S.,    144-45, 

155,  165-G7,  199,  533-34 
Moll,  Dr.  Albert,  213 
Moment  of  death,  memory  at,  316- 

317 
Moore,  Dr.  George,  44 
Morgan,  Prof.  C.  Lloyd,  215 
Morselli,  Prof.  Henry,  420 
Morton,  Miss,  449-50 
Moses.  William  Stainton,  335,  392, 

412-14 
Miiller,  Max,  237 
Mummification,  89-91 
Munro,  Dr.,  130 
Munsterberg,  Hugo,  437 
Music,  value    of,   in   insane   cases, 

206 
Myers,  F.  W.  H.,  50,  232,  346,  349, 

391,  437,  438-39,  443,  445,  459- 

460,  468,  469 
Myths  as  to  the  origin  of  death, 

253-55 

Newnham,  Rev.  P.  H.,  349-50 
Niederhorn,  Dr.,  33 

Odor  Mortis,  28-32 
Old  age,  causes  of,  129-57 
Olfactory  phenomena,  390-93 
Osier,  Dr.  William,  300-1 
Ourches,  Marquis  d',  18 
Ovid,  247 

Paget,  Sir  James,  311 

Pain,  causes  of,  301 

Palladino,  Eusapia,  414-36,  534-35 

Parr,  Thomas,  case  of,  14 

Parsees,  beliefs  of,  243-44 

Pausanias,  243 

Peebles,  Dr.  James  M.,  300 

Perspiration, composition  of,  392-93 

Photography  of  the  invisible,  356- 

358 
Piddington,  J.  G.,  491   97 
Piper,  Mrs.  L.  E.,49,  323-25,  457- 

500,  510  15,  532  33,  535-39 
Planchette  vpriting,  454-57 
Plato,  246  47,  257  59 
Platonic  argument  for  immortality, 

258  59 
Playfair,  Sir  Lyon,  83-84 
Podmore,  Frank,  384,  388,  409,  412 
Poe,  Edgar  Allan,  122 


Porro,  Prof.,  415-16 

Post,  Charles  J.,  91 

Presumption  versus  proof  of  future 

life,  291 
Protozoa,  life  of,  7-11 
Purinton,  E.  E.,  169-70 
Putnam,  Dr.  James  J.,  161 
Putrefaction,  35-40 
Pythagoras,  246 

Questionnaire  on  death,  1 59 

Rabagliati,  Dr.  A.,  186-87,  198, 

209-10 
Radiobes,  529 

Raising  the  dead,  54,  199-200 
Ramsay,  Sir  William,  392-93 
Raps,  coincidental,  385 

indicating  intelligence,  406-8 

Raupert,  J.  Godfrey,  363-67 

Re-animation,  53-54 

Regnault,  Dr.  Felix,  150-52 

Reid,  Dr.  H.  A.,  359 

Resuscitation,  201 

Ribot,  Prof.,  219 

Richardson.  Sir  B.  W.,  42,  43,  53, 

54,  188,  199-200 
Rigor  mortis,  32-35 
Roehrig,  Prof.  R.  L.  0.,  59-60 
Romans,  beliefs  of,  247 
Rosenbach,  Dr.,  188 

Saponification,  40-42 
Savage,  Rev.  M.  J.,  322-23 
Scent,  at  seances,  392-93 

of  animals,  392-93 

Schiller,  Prof.  F.  C.  S.,  159-60,  162, 

195    231-32 
Schofield,  Dr.  A.  T.,  212 
Schopenhauer,  259-60,  290-91 
Schultz,  233 
Scott,  Sir  Walter,  98 
Shaler,  Prof.  N.  S.,  526-27 
Shelley,  339 
Shew,  Dr.  Joel,  126-27 
Shock,  death  from,  121-22 
Sidgwick,  Prof.  Henry,  459 
Simpson,  Dr.  F.  T.,  435 
Sextus,  Carl,  71 
Sleep  and  death,  51-57,  305-6 
Sleep,  theory  of,  204-5,  524-25 
Smead,  Mrs.,  case  of,  500-1 
Smiley,  Mrs.,  case  of,  401-6 
Soldi,  M.,  238 


552 


INDEX 


Solovovo,  Count,  169,  412,  431 
Somnolence,  morbid,  46-47 
Soul,  weighing,  372-78 
Space,  question  of,  382 
Spencer,  Dr.  Thomas  D.,  299-300 

Herbert,  3,  6,  263 

Spinoza,  232,  259 

Spirit  photography,  359-67 

Spiritistic  doctrine  of  immortality, 

248-50 
Spiritual  body,  371-72 
Spontaneous  combustion,  126-28 
Stahelin,  Dr.,  241,  256-57 
Starvation,  death  by,  117-18 
Stephens,  Dr.  C.  A.,  145,   146-47, 

313 
Stevenson,  R.  L.,  233-34 
Stewart,  Prof.  Balfour,  158,  279 
Stigmata,  212-13 
Strangulation,  death  by,  120 
Struve,  Dr.,  53 

Subliminal  consciousness,  437-39 
Sudden  death,  causes  of,  93,  94-96, 

203 
Superstitions,       &c.,       concerning 

death,  534-35 
Sweetser,  Dr.  William,  99,  101,  103, 

108,  222-23 

Tanner,  Dr.  Amy  E.,  535-39 
Tappan,  Cora  L.  V.,  352 
Taylor.  J.  Traill,  360-63 
Tebb  (and  Vollum),  54,  58,  65,  72 
Teichmann,  Dr.  E.,  133 
Tertullian,  263 
Tesla,  Nikola,  162 
Tests  of  death,  19-24,  42-43 
Theosophv,    doctrine   of    immorta- 
lity, 251-53 
Thompson,  Mrs.,  502-4 

Sir  Henry,  463 

Thorns,  William  J.,  13,  14,  15,  16 
Tissues,  rate  of  death  of,  13 
Toortelle,  Dr.,  103 
Tozer,  Basil,  66-67 


Trail,  Dr.  R.  T.,  126,  188 
Trance,  44,  50,  51,  52 

Mrs.  Piper's,  530-31 

Transmission  of  life,  theory  of,  149, 

524-25,  528 
Triviality,  question  of,  506-8 
Tuke,  Dr.  Hack,  213 
Tyndall,  Prof.,  300 

Ultra-violet  light,  371 
Uncooked  foods,  156-57 

Vampires.  38,  51^-21 

Van  Eeden,  Dr.  ¥.,  163-65.  502-4 

Venzano,  Dr.  Joseph,  180,  420-21 

Verrall,  Mrs.,  493.  494,  495  et  seq. 

Vibration  theory  of  life,  194-206 

Virchow,  213,  233 

Vital  exhaustion,  theory  of,  134-35 

Vitality,  theory  of,  522-28 

Voices,  independent,  396-40G 

Vollum,  Dr.,  70-71,  73.     See  Tebb 

Voltage,  to  produce  death,  123-24 

Wagner,  Rudolph,  378 
Wallace,  Prof.  A.  R.,  249 
Walsh,  Dr.  David,  58-59 
Warburton,  Bishop,  241 
Watson,  Prof.,  257 
Wedgwood,  Hensleigh,  442,  454 

Mrs.  Alfred,  ^41-42 

Weight,  remarkable  losses  of,  379- 

381 
Weismann,  Prof.,  7,  11 
White,  Dr.  Edward,  260 
White  crow  incident,  538-39 
Welby,  Horace,  304 
Wilder,  Alexander,  52,  69 
Williamson,  James  R. ,  48 
Wilson,  Dr.  A.  D.,  411 
Wilson,  Prof.  E.  B.,  187,  199 
Wilson,  John  K.,  350 

X.,  Miss,  450-52 
X-rays,  371 


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